Pearland teen found guilty in slaying
After closing arguments, killer of pregnant girlfriend, 16, gets life term
ANGLETON — A jury late Thursday found Ryan Matthews guilty of both counts of capital murder in the slaying of his 16-yearold girlfriend, pregnant by him with twins.
The jury deliberated for five hours after hearing Matthews admit that he lied to detectives when questioned about Arrijana Hill’s death.
“Yes, that was a lie,” Matthews admitted to Assistant Brazoria County District Attorney Travis Townsend, who asked why he told police he wore a different backpack the day Hill was slain.
Judge Patrick Sebesta sentenced Matthews to life, the only option he had.
A juror, who declined to give his name, said,”it was his lying, it didn’t add up.” He also said another factor in the verdict was Matthews’ revelation on the witness stand that he had thrown away the shirt he had worn the day of the slaying.
The Pearland teen’s testimony came just before the jury got the case in the ninth day of his trial. Matthews, who faced two charges of capital murder, was accused of strangling and stabbing Hill after a sexual tryst because he feared the responsibilities of fatherhood would ruin the future he envisioned for himself as a college athlete.
Under tough and relentless questioning from Townsend, Matthews repeatedly admitted to lying to police on the day of the slaying.
“In fact, you’re a liar?” Townsend asked Matthews. “I can be,” said Matthews, 18, who has been certified to be tried as an adult even though he was 16 at the time of the slaying.
Matthews, who remained unruffled with a slight smile, also admitted that he was easily angered and that he lied to police because he feared he would be considered a suspect in Hill’s murder.
Feared being a suspect
He said he was not lying on the witness stand and that he lied to police because he was distraught about Hill’s death and because he did not want his parents to know he had skipped school to have sex with Hill.
Matthews also said for the first time that he had thrown in the trash a blue shirt he wore at Hill’s house because it had a hole in it. Prosecutors said he got rid of it because it was bloodstained.
Under questioning by defense attorney Tommy James Stickler, Matthews said that when he left Hill’s bedroom in her parents’ house in a gated Pearland community on March 21 last year, “She was alive and she was fine.”
In his closing argument Stickler told the four women and eight men on the jury that Matthews’ misstatements to police should not be taken seriously. “People say things that aren’t correct, it’s not because they are lying,” he said. He accused police of elevating the significance of otherwise trivial evidence, pointing to prosecutors’ reference to testimony that Matthews had twice before left by the front door during previous trysts and had hugged Hill as he left, but on the day of the slaying he left by the back door and Hill was not seen.
“They are making something out of nothing,” Stickler said.
He tried to cast doubt about blood found on Matthews clothing and DNA evidence, saying the blood tests were inconclusive and the DNA only proved they were together having sex.
The knife was never found, he pointed out.
Stickler also suggested that the killer might have been a member of a landscaping crew that was mowing a lawn across the street from the Hill residence in the 3200 block of East Cedar Hollow in the Lakes at Country Place community.
‘What about the baby?’
In an impassioned rebuttal, prosecutor Kurt Sistrunk suggested Stickler’s criticisms of the investigation were unreasonable. “What would Mr. Stickler have us bring? Video?” Sistrunk said. “The only witness is dead because this defendant killed her.”
Matthews was the only one with motive and the chance to kill Hill in the 22 minutes from the time he left her house until her brother came home, Townsend said in his closing argument.
Townsend argued that Matthews lost his temper and strangled and stabbed Hill, slicing her carotid artery, then knocking furniture askew to simulate a break-in. Police said the scene appeared to have been staged and that cash and other valuables in the house were untouched. There was no sign of forced entry.
“After the sex he killed her because she asked a question: ‘What about the baby?’ ” Sistrunk told jurors.
Prosecutors said traces of blood were found on the pants he wore at Hill’s house on the day of the slaying and on his shoes.Matthews could be eligible for parole after 40 years.