Youngstown Daily Legal News

Murder convictions affirmed for Cleveland shooter identified by 'Snoopy' hat

ANNIE YAMSON
Special to the Legal News
Published: December 7, 2015

A three-judge appellate panel in the 8th District Court of Appeals recently affirmed a murder conviction out of Cleveland after considering seven assignments of error from the defendant, Brandon Jones.

Appealing from the judgment of the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas, Jones challenged his convictions for aggravated murder, murder, two counts of felonious assault and improper handling of a firearm in a motor vehicle.

The charges against Jones stemmed from the shooting death of Thomas Hall.

Case summary states that, on Jan. 24, 2014, Hall’s mother, Kim Williams, purchased crack cocaine from Jones.

Later that evening, Williams contacted Jones to purchase additional crack cocaine and he agreed to meet her at her residence in Cleveland.

When Jones arrived at Williams’ apartment he encountered Hall, Hall’s girlfriend Kiera and Hall’s cousin, Dominique.

Court documents state that Williams and Jones went into the back bedroom to complete their drug transaction while the others stayed in the living room.

At some point Hall got up and went into the bedroom to check on his mother.

Moments later, the conversation between Jones and Hall escalated into a heated argument over issues of reputation and respect.

At trial, Dominique testified that he went to investigate and saw Jones and Hall facing each other “sizing each other up” while Williams inserted herself between the men and attempted to diffuse the situation.

Williams testified that she felt Jones reach for his gun but she managed to escort him out of the apartment and to his SUV without incident.

Her testimony was corroborated by surveillance video that showed a female and a male walk out of the apartment building and to a dark SUV.

Before Jones left, Williams gave him $40 in cash for the crack cocaine even though she never received the drugs. In response, Jones said, “That $40 just saved your son’s life.”

He then removed a gun from his waistband and placed it on the passenger seat of his vehicle.

Shortly thereafter, Hall and Kiera left the apartment building and drove Dominique home for the evening. Williams also left in order to purchase crack cocaine from another dealer.

While she was away, Williams contacted Jones on his cellphone. She testified that he stated that Hall had “crossed the line” and then abruptly hung up.

When Hall and Kiera returned to the apartment, Hall dropped Kiera off at the front door and went to park the car.

Minutes later, Williams pulled into the parking lot and found Hall lying on the ground with a gunshot wound in his abdomen.

Hall was transported to a hospital and lived for almost two weeks before succumbing to his injuries on Feb. 6, 2014. Two days before his death, he chose Jones as his assailant from a photo lineup.

A witness, Thomas McGee testified that, on the night in question, he saw the victim crawling past his window and described the shooter as wearing a hat with flaps that covered the ears.

Williams also noted the hat in her description to police, referring to it as a “Snoopy” hat because of the ear flaps.

Denise Maclin, another witness, testified that she was friends with Williams and Jones, whom she knew as “BJ” or “Nino.”

Maclin stated that she saw Jones and another man, later identified as Michael McCaulley, in an SUV pulling out of the apartment parking lot with the headlights off.

Maclin testified that the next day, she spoke with Jones, who denied any involvement in the shooting, and with McCaulley, who stated that Jones shot Hall and that he “is not going to go down for that stuff.”

Video surveillance footage shown to the jury depicted the shooting. It showed a man exit the passenger side of a parked SUV, walk up to Hall, pull a firearm from his waistband and shoot Hall who crawled away on his hands and knees.

It wasn’t until June 2014 that investigators found the SUV, which was registered to McCaulley but was in the possession of Milan Wilder, who claimed that Jones had loaned him the car.

Pursuant to a search warrant for the vehicle, investigators discovered the brown hat with ear flaps inside. DNA analysis confirmed that Jones had worn the hat.

After hearing the evidence, a jury returned guilty verdicts and Jones was sentenced in November 2014 to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 33 years.

In his direct appeal to the 8th District court, Jones assigned seven errors to his trial court, none of which were supported by the appellate panel.

Much of his appeal dealt with the trial court’s failure to suppress evidence, specifically, the surveillance footage, evidence gathered from the search of the SUV and Hall’s photo array identification.

Judge Eileen T. Gallagher authored the opinion on behalf of the court of appeals and first held that that the trial court should not have suppressed the video surveillance footage because it was “a fair and accurate depiction of what the system captured” despite the fact that it was a copy of the original footage.

“The state provided sufficient testimony to establish the authenticity of the duplicate videos and demonstrated that the footage was not altered or tampered with such that it should have been deemed unreliable,” Gallagher wrote.

With regard to the search of the SUV, Jones contended that the affidavit supporting the search warrant was not valid because it was based on stale evidence.

According to him, since the shooting happened in January and the search took place in June, the search warrant lacked probable cause given the significant lapse of time. The court of appeals found otherwise.

“Given the nature of the vehicle’s alleged involvement in the crime and the character of the evidence to be seized, we are unable to conclude that it was unreasonable for the trial court and issuing magistrate to conclude that there was a fair probability that contraband or evidence of a crime would be found in the subject vehicle at the time the warrant was issued,” Gallagher wrote.

Jones also argued that Hall’s identification of him as shooter should have been suppressed because the photo array procedure was “unduly suggestive.”

But the court of appeals found that the administration of the photo array complied with all statutory requirements and, even if it had not, “any impropriety would not have been prejudicial.”

“In this case, Hall was familiar with (Jones) from the neighborhood and, as seen from the surveillance footage, was standing face-to-face with (Jones) at the time of the shooting,” Gallagher wrote. “Further, the blind administrator testified that Hall immediately circled (Jones’) photo, indicating his level of certainty.”

Additionally, the appellate panel held that Hall’s identification of Jones could be considered a dying declaration and admissible in court, overruling Jones’ claim that the admission of that evidence denied him his constitutional right to confront witnesses.

The court of appeals went on to overrule all of Jones’ remaining assignments of error including ones that challenged the sufficiency and manifest weight of the evidence and the assistance of his trial counsel.

It ultimately affirmed the judgment of the Cuyahoga County court with Presiding Judge Tim McCormack and Judge Sean Gallagher concurring to form the majority.

The case is cited State v. Jones, 2015-Ohio-4694.

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