Melissa GregoryAlexandria Town Talk
An attempt to secure public funds to hire an expert for a man accused in the shooting death of a 17-year-old Bolton High School student drew comments from the victim's mother during and after the hearing, one of multiple homicide cases in court Wednesday.
The attorney for Jauan Javontea Lloyd, Christopher LaCour, called the need for a firearms/crime scene reconstructionist "paramount" to his defense during a hearing before 9th Judicial District Court Judge Patricia Koch.
Lloyd, 19, is accused of killing Tre'Von Jaron Washington on Feb. 20, 2022, at a private event center on Lee Street. He was 17 at the time of the shooting and was indicted on a first-degree murder charge just before he turned 18.
LaCour called Lloyd's mother to testify about how the family couldn't afford to hire such an expert at approximately $300 an hour and how even paying him to represent their son has created a hardship.
In his motion, LaCour wrote that the state, represented by Rapides Assistant District Attorney Charles Johnson, would rely on experts who had tested and analyzed the evidence. But because his client is indigent, LaCour wrote that he would not have the ability "to meet or to counteract" what the state has available to it.
In responding, Johnson said the state is opposed to using any public funds for Lloyd's defense.
Lloyd's mother, Jacqueline Lloyd, testified that she hired LaCour to represent her son, but said it's taken several years for her and her mother to pay him. They still haven't paid the full fee, she said.
Johnson asked Lloyd to clarify if she was able to pay LaCour from several sources — herself and her mother. Lloyd said it was difficult and that her mother had to increase her workload to help out.
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As the hearing was underway, Washington's mother, Johana Ransom-Brown, began talking from her seat in the back of the gallery. LaCour asked Koch to instruct those in the gallery that they couldn't speak out, and Koch announced that no one was to speak up unless they were testifying.
After that, the hearing continued. Koch eventually denied LaCour's motion, but she did tell him she'd leave the issue open to possibly revisit it in the future.
The hearing was adjourned, and Ransom-Brown left her seat to go discuss the case outside of the courtroom with Johnson. She complained that it already had been two years since her son was killed.
"She's not a victim," she said as Johnson waited for her to discuss the case outside the courtroom. "Her son killed my son."
Lloyd's trial was reset from June 24 to Dec. 9.
Ankle monitor in lieu of bond?
The defense attorney for Telvin Dashawn Gullette, Allen Smith III, tried to persuade Koch to let Gullette secure an ankle monitor instead of posting a $125,000 bond again in his second-degree murder case.
Gullette, 33, remains in the Rapides Parish Detention Center #1 as he awaits trial in the death of Tre'Wande Cordell Vallery, 21. As Smith described during a hearing on his motion, Gullette's charges have changed several times.
When he turned himself in to the Alexandria Police Department after the Dec. 31 shooting on East Sycamore Street, off Browns Bend Road, Gullette was booked into jail on a second-degree murder charge.
He later was formally charged with manslaughter, but that changed after a Rapides Parish grand jury indicted him in May on a second-degree murder charge. When that happened, Gullette's bail was increased to $250,000.
He already had posted a $125,000 bond, but Smith said he was unable to post the remaining half. In his motion, Smith said Gullette had been accepted into an electronic monitoring program. He asked for Gullette to be allowed to wear the monitor and wait at home for trial.
"That's ridiculous," said Rapides Assistant District Attorney Brian Cespiva, who already said he considered the total bail to be too low. He told Koch that Gullette couldn't wear an ankle monitor and call it $125,000.
Smith countered that Gullette isn't a flight risk, that he'd turned himself in and that he doesn't own a passport.
"You probably couldn't run him out of town," he said.
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But Cespiva called the motion an "off the wall" idea for a defendant who "slaughtered" Vallery in front of three juveniles. He said the state "vehemently" objected and that Gullette needed to say in jail.
He also added that Rapides Parish does not participate in any house arrest program.
Smith had a different version of what happened on the night of the shooting, saying Gullette was at home when three people burst into his home and shot his friend in the neck.
Koch said she thought Gullette's bond was fair and that what Smith sought just wasn't done. "The GPS I will not approve," she said.
A status conference was set for Sept. 3 with the trial set for Sept. 23.
Gullette bonded out of jail on Friday afternoon, according to online jail records.
In other cases:
- Defense motions in the case of Philip Barry Felter, 64, were continued until July 17. Felter was arrested on April 24 by the Rapides Parish Sheriff's Office on charges of second-degree murder and unlawful disposal of remains. The victim, 68-year-old Buster Evans, was found on the carport at an abandoned house on Bohannon Road after a fire on March 30. Felter also faces other felony charges in connection to the case. He has not been formally charged yet, and the case is expected to go before a grand jury later this month.
- Taylor James Boyer filed two motions on his own that his attorney, LaCour, told Koch he would not adopt. One of the motions, to be released from his bond obligation, was moot since he was indicted on charges of second-degree murder and attempted second-degree murder. Cespiva told Koch there were two people in the trailer he allegedly shot. "That's the key word, allegedly," LaCour shot back. His bail is set at $300,000, and Koch denied the motion to reduce it, saying she wouldn't go lower than that. Boyer is accused of shooting into a residence on Railroad Avenue in Alexandria on Aug. 23. One person inside, Brad Semper, was wounded. Although the Alexandria Police Department initially characterized his wound as not life-threatening, Cespiva said Semper never left the hospital and died months later, on Nov. 27. A pretrial hearing was set for July 17.
- A hearing for Jessica Marie Bledsoe was continued until June 24. Bledsoe was arrested by the Alexandria Police Department on a second-degree murder charge in the death of Colfax resident James Morrow Ingram, 68. She also faces charges in Grant Parish in Ingram's death. Her attorney, LaCour, said he wanted to have a family member present for the motion to reduce her $200,000 bail, but he couldn't contact her father.
