NEWS

Eden Park shootout case teetering on mistrial

SEAN O’SULLIVAN
THE NEWS JOURNAL

WILMINGTON – Testimony ended abruptly Friday afternoon in the prosecution of two men for the 2012 daylight slayings in Eden Park after a key witness testified that he was offered witness protection by the state in exchange for his testimony.

Defense attorneys for Jeffrey Phillips and Otis Phillips immediately moved for a mistrial or in the alternative, severance, meaning the case against one co-defendant would proceed with the current jury and the other defendant would tried separately later with a different jury.

While the defendants have the same last name, they are not related.

Superior Court Judge Calvin Scott asked attorneys for all sides to submit legal memos by 5 p.m. Friday on the issue of dividing the trial at this point, and if the trial is divided which defendant would stay and which would go. Defense attorneys, however, said they believe that there should be severance and a mistrial.

Scott said earlier he was not going to declare a mistrial over the witness statement.

The News Journal is not identifying the man at this point because he is in witness protection and his life has been threatened.

Otis Phillips, 38, and Jeffrey Phillips, 23, are both charged with the July 8, 2012 daylight slaying of 16-year-old Alexander Kamara Jr. and 47-year-old Herman Curry at a soccer tournament in Eden Park.

Sheldon Ogle, 43, was also killed in the incident. According to police and prosecutors, Ogle drove the getaway car for the shooters and was killed when people in the crowd shot at the trio as they drove off. No one has been charged in Ogle’s homicide.

According to prosecutors the defendants were upset about a friend of theirs being killed early that morning in a separate incident and were looking to get revenge on a member of the Jamaican community. Curry was also a witness against Otis Phillips in relation to the 2008 slaying of Christopher Palmer.

Both Otis Phillips and Jeffrey Phillips face a possible death sentence if convicted.

The witness, a former member of the Sure Shots gang that both Otis Phillips and Jeffrey Phillips allegedly belonged to, was asked about his plea agreement where he admitted to gang participation. The man said he had to serve a five month prison sentence and is on probation.

Deputy Attorney General Ipek Medford then asked the man if he had been promised anything else in exchange for his testimony, apparently expecting the answer “no.”

The man, however, responded, “Just, like, witness protection.”

Attorneys then immediately went to a sidebar conference with the judge and he then instructed the jury to disregard the statement and further advised the panel of 12 jurors and six alternates that they should not conclude that the witness had been threatened by the defendants in any way.

The jury was then taken out of the courtroom and defense attorneys began to press Scott to declare a mistrial and Scott declined.

Jeffrey Phillips’ attorney, Kevin O’Connell, said he then planned to question the man about the payments or other benefits he may have received in the state’s witness protection program. This prompted an objection from Otis Phillips’ attorney Michael Heyden.

O’Connell apparently believed that such questions would raise questions about the man’s credibility on the theory he was testifying in exchange for the payments. Heyden, however, was concerned testimony about significant payments might lead jurors to conclude the man must be telling the truth or the state would not have provided him protection.

Outside the presence of the jury the man also testified he had been threatened by the leader of the Sure Shots gang if he testified. He also said on one occasion in prison he saw Otis Phillips, the defendant made eye contact with the man, and then drew his hand across his neck, as if to say he was going to cut the man’s throat.

He testified that he has not been threatened by Jeffrey Phillips but added he is in fear for his life because of “everything” about the Eden Park trial.

Heyden and O’Connell then asked Scott to sever one or the other of the defendants from the case because they now had conflicting defenses. Furthermore, both sides also suggested that if the cases were severed that a mistrial should still be declared because of the damage done by the reference to witness protection.

Medford told the court that prosecutors oppose both a mistrial and severing one of the defendants at this point.

Scott is expected to rule on Monday.

Contact Sean O’Sullivan at (302) 324-2777 or sosullivan@delawareonline.com or on Twitter @SeanGOSullivan