Opinion ID: 216020
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Wood's Trial

Text: During the brief trial, Harry and Bernard testified to Wood's role in the murder; a few other witnesses detailed Hall's injuries and Harry's actions inside the travel agency. In addition, the government played Wood's videotaped statement, which largely confirmed Harry's version of events leading up to the shooting. The only real question before the jury was whether Wood hired Harry to kill Hall or Harry simply took it upon himself to do so. As a result, the prosecution's case rested on Harry's and Bernard's credibility.
According to Harry, Wood approached him on the morning of June 2 and asked if he want[ed] to make some money. Wood explained that some man had raped [Bernard], and implied that he sought revenge. Harry, twenty-five years old and fresh out of prison, was interested. The pair traveled together in Wood's white Lexus, presumably to find the man in question. While stopped to change vehicles, Wood told Harry that he wanted him to kill somebody. Harry agreed, and they drove together towards the travel agency in Wood's green Lexus. Soon after arriving, Wood saw Hall walk by on his way to work and Wood identified him to Harry as the man that raped [Bernard]. Wood then got out of the car to go buy some weed and gave Harry twenty dollars to purchase something to eat. Upon Wood's return, Harry entered the travel agency and shot Hall twice in the chest. He then passed the gun off to Damion, who was waiting by the train, and left the scene. Three days later, Harry called Wood asking for money. Wood told Harry to go to a local store owned by Juanchi Hildago (Hildago). There, Hildago lent Harry ten dollars. This represented half of the twenty dollars Harry received between the shooting and his arrest. Though Harry claimed Wood had initially offered him $500 for the murder, Harry testified that the subject was never again discussed and payment was never made. In fact, Harry testified that it wasn't like [Wood] really owed [him the $500]. Defense counsel's cross examination focused squarely on Harry's credibility. It targeted his lengthy criminal history, his multiple conflicting accounts of the crime, and his incentive to implicate others to obtain leniency.
The prosecution called Bernard as its final witness. Bernard explained that she and Wood often argued. Bernard's mother sparked a particularly intense fight a few weeks after Hall's death by calling Wood a murderer. In the heat of that argument, Wood told Bernard that he could get the same person that killed [Hall] to do the same thing to [her]. Approximately two weeks later Wood shared details of Hall's murder with Bernard and admitted to orchestrating the killing. Bernard also testified to witnessing a phone call that Wood received from Harry, after which Wood explained that the caller was Hall's killer and that he was asking for money. Bernard then accompanied Wood to Hildago's store, where Wood gave Harry a small amount of cash. Soon after, Bernard contacted the officers investigating the credit card scam and informed them of Wood's role in the murder. On cross examination, defense counsel noted Bernard's involvement in the credit card scheme and continued contact with Wood even after his arrest, implying that Bernard testified to prevent further charges from being brought against her, even though she never believed Wood was involved in the murder. Bernard also admitted to feeling anger towards Wood. Defense counsel implied that this, and the couple's frequent quarrels, gave her reason to implicate Wood in Hall's murder.
Wood's defense was that Harry took it upon himself to kill Hall and then fingered Wood in an attempt to secure leniency. However, the admission of Wood's videotaped statement forced defense counsel to affirm that the events it depicted were for the most part the way it was. This severely strained the argument that Harry acted independently of Wood and complicated efforts to undermine Harry's credibility, because Wood's own statement placed him at the scene, mere moments before the shooting, and acknowledged that he identified Hall to Harry at that time and place as someone Bernard had [a] beef with. Nevertheless, defense counsel's summation attempted to discredit the government's key witnesses and paint Harry as a senseless killer. The prosecutor, in turn, began his summation by characterizing Wood's statement as an attempt to explain away his presence at the crime scene. He noted that Wood knew both the victim and the shooter, but failed to contact the police after the killing. This demonstrated Wood's guilt, he argued, because any citizen would have come forward with such information. The prosecutor then focused squarely on the content of Wood's videotaped statement, arguing that it corroborated Harry's version of events up to the moment of the shooting and, therefore, bolstered the credibility of Harry's entire testimony. To reinforce that point, the prosecutor used details from Wood's statementthe color and make of his car, the number of shots fired, Wood's purchase of marijuana directly before the shootingto confirm details from Harry's testimony. The prosecutor thus used the statement in an effort to make the jury more likely to credit Harry's version of the actual killing once the stories diverged. The prosecutor also directly confronted Wood's theory of the case by rejecting the idea of a senseless murder. He insisted that Harry was not some madman. . . . [He was] motivated in life by money. This led the prosecutor to further emphasize Wood's admission that he gave Harry cash and drugs shortly after the murder. He argued: What possible explanation is there for that? Other than that [Harry] was somehow entitled to that money. . . . There is no other explanation for it. On the third day of deliberations, the jury found Wood guilty of Murder in the First Degree, concluding that he had hired Harry to kill Hall. See N.Y. Penal Law § 125.27(1)(a)(vi).