‘It was a gun battle’
Markeith Loyd claims self-defense in trial for Orlando cop’s killing
Markeith Loyd on Saturday testified in his murder trial that he shot Orlando police Lt. Debra Clayton in self-defense when he killed her outside a Walmart in January 2017.
He also told the jury during his nearly four-hour-long testimony he had a lifelong fear and hatred of police and believed cops killed Black people without reason or repercussions.
Loyd, 46, faces the possibility of being sentenced to death if a 12-person jury finds him guilty of first-degree murder in Clayton’s death. He has pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors say Loyd killed Clayton during a shootout Jan. 9, 2017, at the Walmart on Princeton Street after she tried to arrest him for the murder of his pregnant ex-girlfriend, Sade Dixon.
His attorney, Terence Lenamon, walked him through the events leading up to the shooting at Walmart. He told Lenamon after he killed Dixon he believed the police were going to kill him so he hid out at drug houses and in the woods. He was driving near the store and had to go to the restroom so he went inside and also shopped for some food, he testified.
As he was going to the check-out line he said he noticed Clayton at the front buying items. He went to another line to check out and as he walked out of the Walmart he pulled down his beanie cap over his head to avoid detection. After he walked out, he told jurors he saw a gun in his face. He said he believed it was Clayton, whom he described as “a nice looking sister.”
He said he heard a shot and grabbed the gun in his waistband and started firing. “It was a gun battle,” Loyd said. Prosecutors have said it is unclear who fired first.
In his testimony, Loyd said as he was firing he saw Clayton fall to the ground. He said it was his intent to shoot her in her bullet proof vest so it would “knock her out.”
“I didn’t go and finish her off,” he said. “She was still alive when I left. [Killing her] is not what I wanted. I don’t eat meat because I don’t believe in killing.”
But surveillance video showed he stood over her and fired the fatal shot into her neck in what authorities have described as an execution-style killing.
Loyd drove away from the scene and fired what he described as a “warning shot” at a police officer who confronted him. He then carjacked a man — Loyd claimed the man just gave him his keys — and drove away again before he ditched that car and hopped on a bus. Loyd said he went back to his hideout in the Apopka area before going to Volusia County.
He said he returned to Orlando on Jan. 16 and stayed at a home on Lescot Lane where he was later arrested. Circuit Judge Leticia Marques warned Loyd that he could face sanctions if he discussed how he lost his eye in front of jurors.
Four Orlando police officers punched, kicked and hit Loyd with their rifle muzzles during his arrest, causing his eye injury. The officers were later cleared of criminal wrongdoing or misconduct.
Also during his testimony, Loyd talked about his upbringing in Orlando’s Carver Shores neighborhood where “you could be one of two things, a drug dealer or a robber,” he testified. He also discussed being kidnapped and beaten in the head and said he started selling drugs at 16 to buy food and clothes for his siblings.
He also said he spent about two weeks in a mental institution as a teenager, but he didn’t believe he had a mental illness.
Loyd’s attorneys plan to argue he was insane when he shot Clayton, having become convinced the police wanted to kill him.
But Loyd repeatedly said he did not believe he was crazy and it was just a strategy by Lenamon. During cross examination, Ryan Williams pointed out that at the time he killed Dixon, Loyd said he had four jobs, including as a food delivery driver making $1,000 a week. Loyd also said he knew right from wrong.
He also said, despite his disbelief in the legal system, he encouraged his nephews to become police officers so they could change the system from within.
“Isn’t that what Debra Clayton did?” Williams asked.
Loyd said the only thing he knew was Clayton was trying to kill him.
Loyd repeatedly expressed frustration by sighing and shaking his head during his testimony. He frequently sparred with Williams during cross-examination and referred to him as “Mr. Ryan.”
Defense attorneys also questioned clinical psychologist Jethro Toomer, who noted that Loyd claiming he didn’t fatally shoot Clayton in the head despite surveillance video capturing the act could be indicative of paranoid schizophrenia.
According to Toomer, Loyd’s understanding of that shooting and the events leading up to it were informed by his fear that the police would kill him if he turned himself in.
“When you are suffering of a mental illness ... the only context is your fixed delusional system,” said Toomer, who also sparred with Williams over his credibility and conflicting conclusions by others who evaluated Loyd. “For some people, that context is extreme paranoia, for some people that context may be severe depression. It manifests itself in different ways depending on the circumstances.”
Toomer added, “All of his actions and his description of those appear to be fueled by a belief that he was going to be killed [by police], that he was in fear for his life.”
The court recessed for the weekend after Toomer’s testimony.
Loyd was convicted of first-degree murder in 2019 for killing Dixon and her unborn child, but he avoided the death penalty after jurors recommended he be sentenced to life in prison without parole.