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Evidence ties suspect to crime scene but no eyewitnesses produced
By Ed Meyer
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Saturday, Oct 11, 2008
The interior of the red 1997 Chevrolet Blazer in which two people were slain on New Year's Day is still much like it was on the night of the shootings.
Most of the rear driver-side window is shot out, and there are jagged splinters of glass on the seat where one of the victims, Scott E. Smith, 33, was sitting.
A section of the cargo panel on the front passenger door is missing, and the floor in front on the passenger side is littered with fast-food trash and cigarette butts.
It was in this seat that the defendant, Marquez B. Perry, 19, of Youngstown, was sitting on the night that Smith, who was from Akron, and the second victim, Tammy S. Dickey, 30, of Youngstown, were shot.
Smith was shot five times. Dickey, Perry's girlfriend, was shot twice. One of those shots pierced her jugular vein, according to the autopsy.
Summit County Common Pleas Judge Elinore Marsh Stormer allowed jurors in Perry's murder trial to view the Blazer Friday morning. It was parked downtown on South High Street, cordoned off by yellow crime-scene tape, in front of the Akron police station.
Jurors spent about 15 minutes looking over the Blazer, many peering inside the front seats, then stepping back to write notes on their yellow legal pads.
Although assistant county prosecutors Becky Doherty and Jay Cole have not produced any witnesses who can say they saw what happened inside the Blazer, they do have ballistic and circumstantial evidence apparently tying Perry to the crime scene.
The shootings occurred during a botched drug deal in the parking lot of Lisa's Cabaret strip club on East Market Street in Akron about 9 p.m. on Jan. 1, according to testimony.
Dickey and Perry drove to the cabaret from Youngstown to meet Smith, who was going to sell them a pound of marijuana for $1,200, witnesses said.
Smith was driven to the cabaret by his roommate, Nathan Woodruff, who said Smith jumped out of their vehicle and got into the Blazer.
Ten minutes later, Woodruff said he heard two gunshots, followed by a series of six or seven more.
''I'm sitting there scared out of my mind,'' Woodruff testified.
Woodruff, watching what was unfolding from his driver-side mirror, said he then saw two bare feet dangling out of the rear driver-side door. He said Smith's body came out and hit the ground seconds later.
Woodruff identified Perry, saying he saw Perry outside at the rear end of the Blazer, hurriedly holding up a gun and pulling on the gun slide after the shootings.
Perry got back in, and the Blazer pulled out of the cabaret parking lot and sped away, Woodruff said.
Testimony and a prosecution diagram of the Blazer's front and rear seats showed Dickey was still behind the wheel and Perry was in the passenger seat, steering the vehicle during its getaway from the cabaret.
The section of cargo panel from the Blazer's front passenger door was found by Akron police in the cabaret parking lot after the shooting. It was taken out of an evidence bag and shown to the jury Friday.
Minutes after the shootings, Akron police found the Blazer nearby in a used-car lot on East Market and Seiberling streets and Perry was taken into custody there.
Two Highpoint 9 mm semiautomatic pistols were found there by officers responding to a 911 call from a woman whose vehicle was nearly hit by the speeding Blazer on Market.
The guns — one with a taped-up handle to hold in the magazine — were recovered by officers in the snow beyond a security fence between the used-car lot and an overpass.
Prosecutors wrapped up their case Friday afternoon, but before they did they apparently tied Perry to the pistol with the taped-up gun handle.
Ballistic expert Michael Roberts of the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation testified that a fired 9-mm cartridge recovered by police at Perry's Youngstown apartment matched the markings from the firing mechanism of the taped-up pistol.
That pistol was shown to the jury — its slide still jammed backward and its handle wrapped with black electrical tape, as when police recovered it.
Six fired shell casings recovered from inside the Blazer matched the markings from the firing mechanism of the other 9-mm pistol, Roberts said.
Jason Wells, a lawyer for Perry, attempted to discredit the ballistic evidence. In the cross-examination, Roberts said none of the bullets or bullet fragments recovered from the victims' bodies or their clothing matched the 9 mm pistol with the taped gun handle.
Perry probably will take the stand on Tuesday, when the trial resumes.
Wells has said the shootings occurred when Smith pulled a gun and Perry began struggling with him.
There was a fourth person in the Blazer, according to the prosecution's seating diagram, but police from Akron and Youngstown have not been able to find him, Wells said.
Perry is charged with two counts of aggravated murder and other offenses. But the presence of the fourth person will prompt jury instructions on a charge of complicity to aggravated murder.
Ed Meyer can be reached at 330-996-3784 or emeyer@thebeaconjournal.com.
The interior of the red 1997 Chevrolet Blazer in which two people were slain on New Year's Day is still much like it was on the night of the shootings.
Get the full article here.
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