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South Side stabbing trial underway
By joe gorman
youngstown
Prosecutors say a woman on trial for two counts of felonious assault stabbed a woman during a brawl after a homicide in June 2012 on the South Side.
But the defense attorney, Ed Hartwig, representing Tamika Jones, told jurors in opening statements Tuesday in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court that police have no evidence his client committed the crime.
Hartwig said there is no weapon, no fingerprints, blood analysis, DNA or video showing his client stabbing Victoria Truman in the front yard of her Hilton Avenue home during a brawl after the shooting death of Truman’s boyfriend, Dion Weatherspoon, three doors down just a few hours earlier.
Hartwig said all prosecutors have is eyewitness testimony, and it is shaky eyewitness testimony at that.
“They will rely solely on eyewitness testimony, and I intend to show it’s riddled with inconsistencies,” Hartwig said. Jones, 30, faces two counts of felonious assault in the stabbing of Truman. Jury selection began Monday before Judge Maureen Sweeney and was concluded Tuesday morning.
Weatherspoon, 24, was shot to death June 13, 2012, in the front yard of his home during an argument. Walter Drake, 28, has been charged with murder in Weatherspoon’s death. A trial is set for May 12 before Judge Sweeney.
Assistant Prosecutor Rob Andrews said during his opening statement that a large crowd gathered after Weatherspoon was killed as police arrived to process the crime scene, and several of those people stayed in the neighborhood and went to Truman’s home after police left.
Truman was sitting on the driveway when another woman came up wanting to fight her, and Truman’s friends and family formed a circle so the two could fight, Andrews said.
As Truman and the woman squared off, other women jumped into the fray, Andrews said, and one of those women was Jones. He said witnesses will testify that they saw Jones make stabbing motions as she fought with Truman, who had three wounds to her back that punctured a lung, plus three wounds to her arm and a wound on her hand. She spent about a week in the hospital recovering from her injuries.
Andrews told jurors that they would not see the weapon because police never found it.
Hartwig acknowledged his client participated in the fight but said Jones was fighting with Truman’s mother and did not stab Truman.
He said police waited almost a month to get a secret indictment against Jones, and during that time they interviewed other witnesses but never his client.