Alamance County district attorney Sean Boone and defense attorney Robert A. Singagliese laid out their theories Monday morning about the events that culminated with the fatal shooting of three men inside an apartment at 15 Perry Circle, Burlington, the night of June 30, 2019.
The capital murder trial for Hyquan Johan Parker, 31, black, male, formerly of 610 East Geer Street in Durham, began Monday morning in the superior courtroom at the J.B. Allen, Jr. Court House in Graham and is expected to last several weeks.
Parker is charged with three counts of first-degree murder in the shooting deaths of Tyrone Brandon Nelson, Jr., then 18, of Perry Circle; Kaseem Devon Zinebalist Peterson, then 27, of Oakes Circle; and Jason Deangelo Williams, then 26, of Floyd Street. The defendant is also charged with felony possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
If convicted, Parker could face the death penalty, during the sentencing phase of the trial that will follow the presentation of evidence and testimony later this month.
“Today, theoretical, hypotheticals, what ifs…all give way to the cold, hard light of facts and evidence,”
Boone said in his opening statement to the 12 jurors and two alternates Monday morning. “They are, in this case, about the cold, harsh, and very ugly business of murder.”
Initial evidence recovered by Burlington police investigators showed that the three victims had been fatally shot by a Norinco SKS semiautomatic rifle.
On June 30, 2019, “You could hear the sound of laughter,” as the three victims “were doing what they did time and again, playing their video game and cutting up,” Boone told the jury during his opening statement. Williams’ girlfriend, Jasmine Woodard, who lived at the apartment at 15 Perry Circle with her mother and young son, had been cooking dinner, Boone told the jury.
“She’s preparing plates, takes one up to her mother,” Boone said. As she was preparing another plate, Jasmine hears someone in the living room say, “Put that gun down; there’s one in the head and another in the chamber.” At that point, Boone told the jury, Parker tells Jasmine to get upstairs and she hears gunshots ring out.
The first Burlington police officer who responded to a call about a shooting found Jasmine, and “she was absolutely hysterical,” the D.A. told the jury. There were five hits, “five very bloody, very efficient hits,” Boone said, warning that the evidence the jury would see “is graphic, and it is very ugly.”
“This was indeed a cold, ugly case of murder, and it is a business that Hyquan Parker was experienced at, loved, and was very efficient at.”
‘Alone and outnumbered’
During his opening statement for the defense, Singagliese told the jury, “There were four gang members in a room. Hyquan Parker walked out alive; he walked out with a gun in his hands, but it wasn’t his gun – it was their gun.”
Singagliese countered that Parker – alone, outnumbered, and trapped in Burlington after trying to no avail to get a ride back to Durham – did what he felt he needed to do to stay alive that day.
The defense attorney recounted that a friend had called Parker from Burlington that day to buy drugs and he soon found himself with three other gang members in Burlington on June 30, 2019. “He was feeling trapped; he was feeling stuck…alone, outnumbered, and in a gang house,” Singagliese told the jury Monday morning.
Singagliese recounted how Parker had grown up in east Durham and was exposed early on to gang activity by his older brother, who was affiliated with the Crips, while his mother was overwhelmed” and his father was incarcerated in federal prison.
The result of this, the defense attorney said, was a cycle of poverty, violence and child exploitation. By the time Parker was 14, he was involved in a drive-by shooting. Right before his 16th birthday, Parker pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in 2009 and was sent to prison, where he learned he couldn’t trust anyone to protect him, Singagliese said in his opening statement. Parker was paroled in February 2016, according to the state Department of Adult Corrections.
On June 30, 2019, Parker found himself in Burlington, surrounded by four people whom Singagliese described as having been affiliated with the Crips. “Everyone local was under Williams,” the defense attorney said, telling the jurors how another man had called Parker in Durham to buy drugs, then bought the drugs and drove himself and Parker back to Burlington.
“They actually got robbed,” Singagliese proffered during his opening statement. “At this point, Mr. Parker is exhausted and trying to get back to Durham.”
“Everybody was hanging out in the parking lot,” and at one point, Williams recorded a Facebook live video that showed Parker off to the side, trying to get a rise from some guys from Durham, Singagliese told the jury. “They said no. Exhausted and on drugs, Mr. Parker started wondering why he was stuck.”
According to the defense, Williams went inside the apartment at 15 Perry Circle and grabbed the rifle, while an exhausted Parker “passed out in the apartment for a little bit.” When he woke up at 7:50 p.m. – about 15 minutes before the shooting – Parker started “making his own Facebook live video,” and said he needed to get back to Durham, Singagliese said.
The defense told the jury how the ear-witness to the shootings, Woodard, had told Burlington police that “Mr. Parker was trembling and told her to get upstairs.
“She remained upstairs, and then she heard the gunshots,” Singagliese said. “The truth is, Mr. Parker was afraid for his life.” According to the defense attorney’s description, Parker left the back door, carrying the rifle in one hand and the phone in the other – “and talked on his phone with his mother for eight minutes.”
When police arrived and searched the apartment, Singagliese said “another gang member” was inside, standing over the bodies of two victims, rifling through one man’s pockets, while neighbors told police they had seen Parker stumbling and falling as he attempted to leave the scene.
“You’ll keep an opening mind, showing a prior record and gang affiliation,” the defense attorney told the jury Monday. What’s missing, however, is “any evidence of an actual motive.”
Rather, Parker was acting “out of a sense of danger, based on his experience,” Singagliese said in his opening statement.
Parker found crouching in a carport at 1530 Morgantown Road
Boone called as his first witness a Burlington police officer who was the first to arrive at 15 Perry Circle the night of the shooting; and a K-9 handler for the Burlington police department who ultimately located Parker, crouching between a car and carport at 1530 Morgantown Road, and later that evening recovered the SKS rifle used in the shooting at 1015 Sharpe Road in Burlington.
Jurors also heard testimony Monday afternoon from Jessica Pappas, a forensic firearms analyst for the State Crime Lab in Raleigh, who described her methodology for examining microscopic evidence from the SKS rifle and cartridges in the case.
Both the rifle and rounds of ammunition were admitted into evidence Monday, and positively identified by the Burlington K-9 handler and the forensic firearms analyst as having been evidence collected in the case.
Under direct examination by Boone, Pappas testified that her examination showed the barrel length of the rifle measured 20.55 inches, which she termed an “altered status.”
“The legal length of barrels for rifles is 16 inches,” Pappas testified.
Based on her analysis of the firearm and cartridges, as well as test fires conducted at the State Crime Lab (a division of the North Carolina Department of Justice), Pappas confirmed during her testimony Monday afternoon that three out of the five spent shell casings appeared to have been fired from the Norinco SKS rifle, “and two could have been,” the D.A. summarized.
Two jurors contact clerk with concerns: one excused, one to continue serving
The 12 members and two alternates selected to serve on the jury for Parker’s trial consist of: nine white males, four white females, and one black female.
Meanwhile, two jurors apparently contacted Alamance County’s clerk of court over the weekend to express concerns about their ability to serve on the jury for Parker’s trial.
Thomas Lock, a visiting superior court judge from Johnston County presiding over Parker’s trial in Alamance County superior court, ultimately excused a white male juror, who told Lock prior to opening statements that his selection late last week had caused him “extreme stress” as a result of a preexisting medical condition and financial concerns. One of three alternate jurors was later seated in place of the excused juror, leaving two remaining alternates.
The second juror, a white female brought in for questioning prior to opening statements, told Lock Monday morning that she simply wanted to make him aware she’s 17 weeks pregnant and deemed “high-risk.” The juror elaborated that she has two upcoming doctor’s appointments, one at the end of this month and another early next month.
Lock said he’s hopeful the trial will be over by then but asked the juror to let him know if anything happens that could negatively affect her ability to continue serving on the jury.
Neither juror had made the judge and attorneys aware of a medical condition during the three-week jury selection process, the attorneys for the state and defense said during a pre-trial discussion outside the jury’s presence Monday morning.
Lock announced prior to opening statements that he was denying the latest motions filed last week by the state and by the defense.
The D.A. had sought to exclude evidence regarding the character of or specific acts by the three victims, according to the court file.
Parker’s defense team had filed a motion asking Lock to either continue the case or declare it a non-capital trial.
Lock announced in open court Monday, outside the presence of the jury, that both motions were denied.
Once the trial got underway, approximately two dozen friends and family members of the three victims filled the courtroom benches behind Boone and Alamance County assistant D.A. Elizabeth Olivier, who is also prosecuting the trial.
About a half-dozen spectators and supporters were seated on the opposite side of the courtroom, behind Parker and his defense attorneys, Singagliese and Christine Malumphy, who is also with the capital defender’s office in Durham.
