Oakland man acquitted of murder charges over 2017 fatal shooting
“The court will improperly wear two hats — that of fact-finder for Hickman's `truth telling' and that of the impartial judge in Mr. Jones' trial. These two positions are inapposite and create, at the very least, the appearance of partiality.” — Annie Beles, Odell Jones' attorney
OAKLAND >> A 30-yearold man was acquitted of murder, robbery and assault charges Monday, in a case that hinged largely on the word of a co-defendant who agreed to testify in exchange for leniency.
Odell Jones of Oakland was found not guilty of murdering 25-year-old Justin Sessions in a November 2017 fatal shooting that authorities say was motivated by a robbery plot. Jones' co-defendant, Darryl Hickman, 34, took a plea deal to agree to testify against Jones, which the defense argued gave him a motive to falsely accuse Jones of the shooting.
“We are very pleased with the jury's decision,” Jones' attorney, Annie Beles, said after the verdict, but she declined to comment further.
Justin Sessions was shot and killed after he and his brother, Joshua Sessions, showed up to a meeting where they planned to buy laptop computers at a lower rate from Hickman and his cohort, who police contended was Jones. The meeting turned out to be a robbery setup, and Sessions was shot in the back as he tried to run away.
Joshua Sessions identified Jones as the shooter but previously had picked someone else out of a photo lineup and told police he wasn't 100% certain about Jones being there. Hickman also identified Jones as his cohort, but Beles argued to the jury that Hickman was just “trying to save his own skin” by giving police a name to avoid a life sentence.
Hickman pleaded no contest to second degree murder, with a deal that if he testified truthfully he'd receive manslaughter and an 11-year prison term, court records show.
Elsewhere in Alameda
County, two other murder trials center on a similar plea deal.
On Monday, a jury convicted Brenton Boatwright of second-degree murder in a 2019 shooting after listening to testimony from his former co-defendant, Abdulsatar Muqbel, who was part of a shootout with Boatwright. In that case, Muqbel also pleaded no contest to a murder charge with the promise that if he testified truthfully, he'd receive a downgrade to manslaughter. In another courtroom, William Hommert is facing murder charges based largely on the testimony of former co-defendant Trevor Simpson.
In a pretrial motion, Beles attacked the use of such deals, arguing that they inherently bolster the credibility of the informants. She wrote that unless a judge stepped in and accused the witness of lying during the trial, jurors likely would assume the person was telling the truth. “The court will improperly wear two hats — that of fact-finder for Hickman's `truth telling' and that of the impartial judge in Mr. Jones' trial,” Beles wrote. “These two positions are inapposite and create, at the very least, the appearance of partiality.”