Lyons v. State

• Decision Date: 14 November 2013
• Docket Number: No. 2012–KA–01217–SCT.,2012–KA–01217–SCT.
• Citation: 125 So.3d 653
• Parties: Yardley Shelton LYONS v. STATE of Mississippi.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

125 So.3d 653

Yardley Shelton LYONS

v.STATE of Mississippi.

No. 2012–KA–01217–SCT.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

Nov. 14, 2013.

Office of State Public Defender by Erin Elizabeth Pridgen, George T. Holmes, Wilbert Levon Johnson, attorneys for appellant.

Office of the Attorney General by Stephanie Breland Wood, John R. Henry, Jr., attorneys for appellee.

Before DICKINSON, P.J., KITCHENS and CHANDLER, JJ.

KITCHENS, Justice, for the Court:

¶ 1. Yardley Shelton Lyons was indicted for one count of carjacking ¹ (Count I) and one count of kidnapping ² (Count II) in the Circuit Court of Tunica County. The indictment accused Lyons of perpetrating these acts against persons over the age of sixty-five years, subjecting him to the elderly sentence enhancement which allowed the court to sentence him to twice the maximum statutory sentence for both counts. After finding Lyons guilty on both counts, the jury also found that he was eligible for the elderly sentence enhancement. The trial court did not impose the sentence enhancement, and instead sentenced Lyons to fifteen years for carjacking and twenty-five years for kidnapping, to be served consecutively. The court later amended Lyons's sentence on Count II, reducing it from twenty-five years to fifteen years.

¶ 2. Lyons filed a motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict (JNOV), or, in the alternative, for a new trial. He argued that the trial court erred in failing to grant a motion for directed verdict at the close of the State's case, that the jury verdict was against the overwhelming weight of the evidence, and that the prosecution had failed to prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt. This motion was denied.

¶ 3. On appeal, the Indigent Appeals Division representing Lyons has filed a brief pursuant to Lindsey v. State, 939 So.2d 743 (Miss.2005), stating that the record has been scoured and no arguable issues have been found. After reading the entire transcript and record, we have been unable to discern any issues which would warrant additional briefing or reversal. Accordingly, we affirm Yardley Shelton Lyons's convictions and sentences for carjacking and kidnapping.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

¶ 4. The facts are gleaned from the testimony of the ten witnesses presented by the State. Lyons offered no witnesses and did not testify. On July 1, 2011, Eva Honsa and her husband Horst, of Savannah, Tennessee, went to Bally's Casino in Tunica. At the time of trial, Eva was seventy-nine years old, and Horst was eighty-two. They arrived between 1:30 and 2:00 p.m., and parked their tan 2005 Pontiac Bonneville automobile in the casino's handicapped parking zone. Eva got out of the driver's seat and went to the trunk to get Horst's wheelchair, which he had required since losing one of his legs. Eva described what happened next:

... I put the wheelchair down, and I was going to the back seat to get my stuff out, you know, my purse or whatever, my coupons, whatever it was, and while I was bending down, I noticed somebody behind me, and I thought, “Well, it must be somebody who knows us, you know, to come—to greet us or what,” and then I raised up, and he put his—the person put his arm around my neck and pulled me back and said, “Don't make a sound or I'll kill you.”

A casino shuttle bus driver saw this happening and pulled the bus behind the Honsas' vehicle in an effort to prevent the assailant's escape. The man quickly got into the car, and was able to back up, turn around, and escape the parking lot, with Horst Honsa still in the vehicle.

¶ 5. Eva never saw her attacker's face. She described him as a young, tall, slim, black man. The driver of the bus, Jerry Oden, recognized Eva's assailant as Yardley Shelton Lyons, a man to whom she had been introduced earlier in the day. Oden had been introduced to Lyons that morning by Derico Washington, a valet at the casino. Washington had met Lyons when Lyons asked to borrow Washington's cell phone. Lyons would not tell Oden his name at first, so Oden asked to see his ID. Lyons handed it over, and Oden specifically recalled having learned that the man's name was Yardley Lyons. She also remembered talking to him about his neighborhood in Memphis, with which she was familiar because she also was a Memphis resident. Around 1:30 p.m. that day, Oden saw Lyons in the parking lot of the casino, standing near some hedges and acting suspiciously. She drove her bus around to get a better look, and watched him leave the hedges as the Honsas' vehicle pulled into the parking lot. Oden witnessed Eva getting out of the car and digging around in the back seat for something as Lyons approached her. Lyons grabbed the back of Eva's shoulder and put his hands around her neck. At this point, Oden drove the bus behind the car to attempt to block it in, and radioed security for assistance. She helped Eva get out of the way of the car as Lyons drove away, with Horst in the passenger seat.

¶ 6. There was no video footage of the incident. Lane Wester, an employee in the surveillance department at Bally's, heard about the incident in the parking lot and trained some cameras on the area. He was told that the person who had stolen the car was the same person who had asked to borrow an employee's cell phone earlier in the day, and was able to determine, by looking at the surveillance footage of Lyons throughout the day, that the person who had stolen the car was the person who had used the employee's cell phone earlier.

¶ 7. Horst Honsa testified that he was half in, half out of the car when a man jumped into the driver's seat and drove out of the parking lot. Horst said the man told him he had a gun, but Horst never saw one. The man held a box cutter about ten to fifteen centimeters from Horst's throat; “Frightening close,” Horst testified. After leaving Bally's, the carjacker drove to Tunica National Golf Course. Horst testified that he got only a side-profile view of the driver, and did not identify him at trial. He did testify that the driver had a wart on his right cheek.

¶ 8. Jimmy Gipson, an employee at Tunica National, testified that he was at the front entrance of the clubhouse when a gold Bonneville pulled into the lot at high speed. Gipson identified a young black man driving, and an old white man, missing a leg, in the passenger seat. Thinking the driver was just dropping the passenger off, Gipson asked whether he could assist in getting the passenger out of the car. Horst refused to get out for some time, while the driver aggressively told Gipson to remove Horst from the vehicle. Gipson was finally able to get Horst out of the car, and the driver left.

¶ 9. Detective Rico Harris of the Tunica County Sheriff's Office was the investigator assigned to the case. He testified that a description of the vehicle had been radioed to local police, and the Walls Police Department made contact with the vehicle after Horst was dropped off at Tunica National. There was a pursuit, and the driver of the vehicle fled to nearby Memphis, Tennessee. The driver of the car escaped on foot after stopping in Memphis and managed to elude the police. Harris developed Lyons as a suspect after talking with Derico Washington, who explained about his meeting with Lyons...