The Akron Legal News

2nd District Court rejects murderer's appeal

ANNIE YAMSON
Special to the Legal News
Published: March 25, 2014

A Montgomery County man’s felony murder conviction was upheld recently when the 2nd District Court of Appeals overruled an appeal from his conviction in the court of common pleas.

Following a jury trial, Levi Slaughter was convicted of felony murder with felonious assault as a predicate offense, discharging a firearm on or near a prohibited area, a firearm specification on each count and having a weapon under disability, which was tried to the bench.

The trial court imposed consecutive sentences resulting in a total of 21 years to life in prison for Slaughter.

The charges stemmed from the shooting death of Douglas Byrd, who died on Jan. 17, 2012 as the result of gunshot wounds to his forehead, chest and hip.

Earlier that day, Byrd accompanied his girlfriend to a local residence so that she could pick up her vehicle.

He then decided to walk to a nearby Sunoco station.

While he was at the gas station, Byrd ran into Slaughter, who was pumping gas into a gray Honda Accord with severe front-end damage.

The car belonged to Slaughter’s girlfriend, Dominique McCoy, who was sitting in the front passenger seat of the car.

In the back seat was Slaughter’s cousin, Darryl Slaughter.

Surveillance cameras captured Byrd waiving to Slaughter.

The two men had a brief conversation before Slaughter got in the driver’s seat of the Honda and Byrd got into the back seat next to Darryl.

The video depicted Byrd wearing a maroon jacket and dark pants and Slaughter in a gray hooded sweatshirt and jeans.

Slaughter drove away and eventually stopped the car near an Advanced Autoparts store.

Lacrisha Gibson testified at trial that she was sitting in a parked car outside of the store when she saw the gray Honda.

She heard arguing coming from inside and saw a man wearing a maroon jacket step out of the vehicle.

The man began walking quickly down the street when Gibson saw a man in a gray sweatshirt exit from the driver’s seat.

According to her, Slaughter quickly followed Byrd, pulled out a semiautomatic gun and shot Byrd in the head.

Gibson said she ran into the store after the first gunshot but that she heard more shots once inside.

When she saw the Honda drive away and a body lying in the street, she called 911.

Darryl testified that he was high when Byrd joined him in the back seat and he did not know why he got in the vehicle.

He told the court that Byrd and Slaughter spoke with each other inside the car but that he didn’t pay attention to what they were saying.

When Slaughter stopped, Darryl said that he saw Byrd get out of the vehicle, Slaughter run after him and then shoot him.

When Slaughter got back in the car Darryl asked what happened and Slaughter replied, “You didn’t hear what he said, what he was talking about on the phone.”

Two days later, Darryl called the police to report what he saw that afternoon.

McCoy did not want to testify against Slaughter so she was called as a court’s witness.

Though she told the police that Slaughter said “I’m about to rob him” right before the shooting, at trial she claimed that she was drunk and high when the shooting took place and did not learn about Byrd’s death until she saw the local news.

The trial court admitted a letter that Slaughter wrote to his uncle while awaiting trial into evidence.

In it Slaughter wrote, “They don’t have any evidence but three shell casings, no prints, no gun none of my clothes, a dead body ... A witness statement from my cuz Darryl saying I did (it). Yeah, he snitching on me, Bra. Nobody that can point me out as the shooter though but Darryl. I pick (Byrd) up at Sunoco gas station and dropped him off by Advance Auto Parts next to Rally’s and he got out of the car. Then I got out of the car and you put the rest together.”

The guilty verdict followed as well as Slaughter’s direct appeal to the Second District in which he argued, among other things, that the trial court erred by imposing consecutive sentences and not including its findings in the sentencing entry.

Writing on behalf of the district’s three-judge appellate panel, Judge Jeffrey Welbaum cited the 9th District Court of Appeals’ holding in State v. Just.

In that case, the court discussed how 2011 Am.Sub.H.B. 86 impacted R.C. 2929.19(B)(2) and ultimately eliminated the requirement to include consecutive sentence findings in sentencing entries.

“Although the General Assembly reinstated language requiring the court to make certain findings before issuing consecutive prison terms,” the 9th District held, “it excised the statutory subsection requiring a trial court to explicitly set forth those findings in imposing its sentence.”

“We agree that Ohio law does not currently require a sentencing entry to include consecutive sentence findings in sentencing entries,” wrote Judge Welbaum, noting that Ohio’s Supreme Court is due to address the issue later this year and that, if it rules differently, Slaughter’s case could be modified by a nunc pro tunc entry that corrects the sentencing entry.

In another assignment of error, Slaughter challenged the trial court’s ability to call McCoy as a witness even though she did not want to testify.

“Slaughter contends that the trial court abused its discretion in calling Dominique, Slaughter’s girlfriend, as the court’s witness solely for impeachment purposes and without showing surprise or affirmative damage to the state,” wrote Judge Welbaum.

The appellate panel, however, noted that the purpose of calling a witness as a court’s witness is to allow for a “proper determination in a case where a witness is reluctant or unwilling to testify.”

Although McCoy indicated before trial that she would align herself with Slaughter, she was an eyewitness and had made statements to detectives implicating Slaughter in the shooting, therefore, her testimony was important to the determination of the case.

“The goal of a trial is to seek the truth,” wrote Judge Welbaum. “We should leave it to the sound discretion of the trial court if, when and why a witness is called by the court.”

After it overruled the remainder of Slaughter’s assignments of error, the court of appeals affirmed the judgment of the Montgomery County court.

Judges Mary Donovan and Michael Hall concurred.

The case is cited State v. Slaughter, 2014-Ohio-862.

[Back]