Lawyers for Loyd want to him to stand trial once for two killings
Motion filed Friday argues that the two slayings are linked
Lawyers for Markeith Loyd want the accused killer to stand trial once for the slayings of his pregnant ex-girlfriend, Sade Dixon, and Orlando police Lt. Debra Clayton, rather than decide the cases separately.
Loyd’s first-degree murder trial in Dixon’s December 2016 killing is currently slated for September.
In a motion filed Friday, Loyd’s lawyer Terence M. Lenamon argues that the two slayings are linked — due in part to a recent ruling by Circuit Judge Leticia J. Marques allowing jurors in the Dixon trial to learn that Loyd is also accused of shooting Clayton to avoid capture.
“Because of this Court’s ruling, the Defendant is now in the position where he must substantially defend against the State’s theory that the shooting of Sgt. Clayton is evidence of consciousness of guilt in Ms. Dixon’s murder through lay and expert witness testimony,” Lenamon wrote.
The ruling, Lenamon argued, made Clayton’s killing “a feature in” Dixon’s.
In a parallel motion, Lenamon asked to delay trial in the Dixon killing until April “so that it may be tried in conjunction with” Loyd’s alleged killing of Clayton.
The defense lawyer wrote that he is still deep in preparations to defend Loyd in the Clayton slaying. More than 20 civilian witnesses, as well as several crime scene and police witnesses, have not yet been interviewed by the defense, Lenamon said.
Authorities say Loyd killed Dixon Dec. 13, 2016. When Clayton confronted Loyd in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart on Princeton Street to arrest him Jan. 19, 2017, he opened fire — killing her, police said. A master sergeant at the time of her killing, Clayton was promoted to lieutenant posthumously.
Marques in her recent ruling said that prosecutors could tell jurors in the Dixon case that Loyd shot Clayton, but would not be allowed to introduce the fact that she was killed.
“The fact that she died is not relevant to any material issue in [the case of Dixon’s killing],” Marques wrote. “The fact that [Loyd] shot Debra Clayton to avoid arrest for Ms. Dixon’s shooting and then ran is all the State needs to establish.”
Jurors in the Dixon case will also not be allowed to hear Clay
ton’s radio transmissions or see surveillance footage of the officer’s killing, but can be told that the same gun was used to shoot Dixon and Clayton, which Loyd had with him when he was arrested, Marques ruled.
However, in his latest motions, Lenamon argues
that the judge’s attempt to shield jurors from the fact that Clayton died is unlikely to be effective.
“Although the Court precluded evidence that Sgt. Clayton was killed, it is without a doubt that most if not all jurors know or can surmise that Sgt. Clayton died in the line of duty considering Mr. Loyd’s case has inundated Orange County’s news cycle for years,” he
wrote. Loyd, 43, is being held at the Orange County Jail without bail.