People v. Powell

• Decision Date: 30 December 2015
• Docket Number: NO. 5-13-0200 cons.,NO. 5-12-0258,5-12-0258,5-13-0200 cons.
• Citation: 2015 IL App (5th) 120258 -U
• Parties: THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. MARCUS POWELL, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: United States Appellate Court of Illinois

2015 IL App (5th) 120258-U

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. MARCUS POWELL, Defendant-Appellant.

NO. 5-12-0258

NO. 5-13-0200 cons.

APPELLATE COURT OF ILLINOIS FIFTH DISTRICT

December 30, 2015

NOTICE

Decision filed 12/30/15.The text of this decision may be changed or corrected prior to the filing of a Petition for Rehearing or the disposition of the same.

NOTICE

This order was filed under Supreme Court Rule 23 and may not be cited as precedent by any party except in the limited circumstances allowed under Rule 23(e)(1).

Appeal from the Circuit Court of Madison County.

No. 08-CF-2290

Honorable James Hackett, Judge, presiding.

PRESIDING JUSTICE SCHWARMdelivered the judgment of the court.

Justices Cates and Moore concurred in the judgment.

ORDER

¶ 1Held: The defendant is unable to establish that his convictions should be reversed.

¶ 2 I. BACKGROUND

¶ 3 In February 2012, following a week-long trial with dozens of witnesses, a Madison County jury found the defendant, Marcus Powell, guilty of first-degree murder (720 ILCS 5/9-1(a)(2)(West 2008)) and aggravated discharge of a firearm (720 ILCS 5/24-1.2(a)(2)(West 2008)).Viewed in the light most favorable to the prosecution(People v. Ehlert, 211 Ill. 2d 192, 202(2004)), the jury could have reasonably concluded the following from the evidence presented for its consideration.

¶ 4The defendant and Kevin "Goose" Campbell were once friends, but their relationship soured in 2007, and they began feuding.Ostensibly, their differences either started or escalated when someone robbed and battered the mother of the defendant's child, and the defendant concluded that Campbell was responsible.

¶ 5 In April 2007, Campbell's wife, Sophia, was dropping a friend off at an apartment complex in Brooklyn, Illinois, when "a car pulled in behind [her] and blocked [her] in."Two men then approached Sophia's car; Sophia heard the defendant say, "Catch this for Goose"; shots rang out, and Sophia was shot 12 times.Sophia subsequently spent several weeks in the hospital and purchased a Glock .40 caliber pistol.When Campbell later saw the defendant at a nightclub that Campbell frequented, he punched the defendant in the face.

¶ 6 On the night of October 6, 2008, Campbell drove his silver Lincoln LS from his girlfriend's house in Madison to a strip club in Brooklyn, where he picked up his friend, Michael Ford.At approximately 11:40 p.m., as Campbell and Ford were driving back through Madison, the defendant, accompanied by Cortez Davis and Lester Smith, drove his purple Cadillac Escalade alongside Campbell's Lincoln and fired shots into the car with a 5.7 mm pistol.The defendant then sped off, and Campbell pulled over and parked at a nearby apartment complex.Campbell and Ford then started running towards Campbell's house on Skeen Street, which was approximately a mile away.Once they arrived at the house, Campbell put on a hooded sweatshirt and retrieved Sophia's Glock from the dresser where she kept it.Campbell and Ford then headed back to Market Street to retrieve Campbell's car.

¶ 7 Meanwhile, after dropping Smith off, the defendant and Davis drove to the defendant's aunt's house in East St. Louis.There, the defendant obtained a .223 caliber rifle from a man in a Dodge Magnum.The defendant also borrowed his aunt's maroon Ford Fusion, which had distinctive flying-eagle license plate frames on the front and back.At that point, Davis and the defendant"split up," and Davis assumed possession of the defendant's Escalade.The defendant then headed back to Madison in his aunt's Fusion and drove around looking for Campbell.

¶ 8 Shortly after midnight on October 7, 2008, as Campbell and Ford were walking back to Campbell's car, the defendant pulled up in the Fusion while they were traversing a parking lot near Sixth Street and McCambridge Avenue, less than two blocks from Campbell's house.After yelling something at Campbell, the defendant began shooting at him from out of the front-passenger's side window.From behind a parked car, Campbell shot back at the defendant with Sophia's Glock, and the two exchanged gunfire for approximately a minute.During the shootout, the defendant used the 5.7 mm pistol and the .223 rifle, and several 5.7 mm bullets struck a house on Sixth Street.As Campbell was subsequently running home, the defendant drove to Skeen Street and fired multiple .223 rounds into Campbell's house.Unbeknownst to the defendant, Sophia's 12-year-old son, DeLarrian, who was sitting by the front door doing homework at the time, was killed when a bullet struck him in the head.

¶ 9 When Campbell arrived home moments later, he found DeLarrian lying dead on the living room floor by the front door.Having left his cell phone in his car, Campbell ran to a neighbor's house and called Sophia, who was at work at the time.When Sophiacame home, Campbell went to a cousin's house in Collinsville, because he"felt guilty" and "couldn't deal with it."Meanwhile, Smith and the defendant had spoken on the phone, and the defendant had indicated that he was in "his auntie's car" and had just gotten into a shootout with Campbell.Several hours later, Campbell went to the Madison police department, told investigators what had happened, and was arrested on a weapons charge.

¶ 10 On the morning of October 7, 2008, the defendant called Smith and asked him to find out whether there was any truth to rumors that someone had been killed in Madison the night before.After inquiring into the matter, Smith called the defendant back, advising that "some 12-year-old kid [had] got[ten] killed over there."Smith also learned that there were rumors that he had somehow been involved in the shooting.When the police later contacted Smith, he went to the Madison police department, and told investigators what he knew.

¶ 11 On the afternoon of October 7, the police arrested Davis while he was still in possession of the defendant's Escalade.Investigators subsequently questioned him about what had occurred the night before, and eventually, he also told them what he knew.

¶ 12 During the course of their investigation, the police found numerous 5.7 mm and .223 caliber shell casings at the scene near Sixth and McCambridge.An empty .40 caliber magazine and 21 .40 caliber shell casings that had been fired from Sophia's Glock were also found.On the street in front of Campbell's house on Skeen, 11 .223 shell casings were collected.Fragments of 5.7 mm bullets were recovered from Campbell's Lincoln and the house on Sixth Street.

¶ 13 The police located the maroon Fusion at the Ellis Park Metrolink station, where the defendant's aunt parked it for her commute to work.On the outside of the car, a spent .223 shell casing was found lodged near the driver's side windshield wiper.On the inside, another .223 casing was found on the floorboard in front of the driver's seat.A box of Sellier & Bellot .223 ammunition was found underneath the driver's seat, and a Fabrique Nationale 5.7 mm ammunition box was found in the glove compartment.A fingerprint matched to the defendant was later identified on one of the .223 cartridges from the box of Sellier & Bellot ammunition.

¶ 14 Ballistics examinations revealed that all of the collected 5.7 mm bullet fragments and shell casings had been fired from the same weapon and that all of the casings had Fabrique Nationale headstamps.The examinations further revealed that all of the .223 shell casings had been fired from the same weapon and that all had Sellier & Bellot headstamps.

¶ 15 On October 9, 2008, at approximately 1 a.m., a patrol officer in St. Charles County, Missouri, observed a black Dodge Charger operating without a light illuminating its rear license plate.When the officer tried to stop the car, it sped away and briefly fled before turning into a hotel parking lot."As soon as the vehicle made its complete stop, the left[-]rear door opened[,] and [the defendant] exited and ran on foot."The officer stayed with the Charger's two other occupants and did not give chase.When a license-plate check revealed that the Charger and the defendant were wanted in connection with DeLarrian's murder, the officer's dispatcher advised her that "several agencies [were] en route to cover [her]."

¶ 16 Additional officers soon arrived at the scene of the traffic stop, and a perimeter was set up to stop and check all vehicles coming in and out of the area.Shortly thereafter, the defendant"blew by" one of the checkpoints in a green Ford Explorer, almost hitting an officer in the process.The defendant then led police on a highway pursuit with speeds exceeding 100 miles per hour.The defendant eventually stopped along Interstate 70, scaled a fence along a frontage road, and "took off towards an industrial park area" where the police "lost him."

¶ 17 Later that day, the United States Marshal's Fugitive Task Force was called out to locate the defendant.The defendant was subsequently found hiding in a storage shed at a trailer park in St. Charles County and was taken into custody.

¶ 18 While incarcerated at the Madison County jail following his arrest, the defendant discussed his killing of DeLarrian with fellow inmates James Williams and James Nicholas.During those discussions, the defendant advised, among other things, that he had used his aunt's car and an automatic rifle with a "shell catcher on it."The defendant also indicated that he had shot up Campbell's house because "he thought [Campbell] was going home to get another gun."The defendant explained that DeLarrian "happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time."Campbell testified that when he encountered the defendant in jail, the defendant had "basically [said that]he was sorry for what had happened and [to] tell Sophia that he[ ][was] sorry for what had happened."The defendant exercised his right not to testify at trial.

¶ 19 II.DISCUSSION

¶ 20 On appeal, the defendant maintains that we should reverse his convictions and remand...