RALEIGH -- For the past week, judges reviewing the murder conviction of Greg Taylor heard fuzzy recollections from drug addicts and prostitutes who roamed the streets of Southeast Raleigh in September 1991.
Nearly half of the 14 witnesses called to testify were breaking the law the night of the murder: hooking for crack, driving drunk, smoking crack cocaine. Another was in jail for embezzlement. They took the stand one by one, sober and graying, offering assurances that they've since straightened out their lives.
Taylor is asking a trio of judges to undo a 1993 jury conviction he says was a mistake. Monday was the fifth and final day of testimony; the judges are expected hear lawyers' final arguments Wednesday and decide whether to set Taylor free or order him back to prison.
Sheila Crowder, the star witness against Taylor, admitted that she has bipolar disorder and that she drank a fifth of liquor, smoked five rocks of crack and drank three 40-ounce beers before spotting fellow prostitute Jacquetta Thomas climbing into Taylor's SUV the night she died.
Crowder said that Taylor's SUV was a two-door and that his drug partner, Johnny Beck, had to get out of the vehicle to let Thomas into the backseat. But police photos showed that the backseat of Taylor's SUV was down flat and covered in beach equipment and other sporting goods.
"The reality is that you have to take cases as you find them," said Richard Myers, a law professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "Street crime in particular is committed by sketchy people on sketchy victims in front of sketchy witnesses."
Prosecutors and Taylor's lawyers wanted it both ways. They tried to discredit witnesses whose stories of the night had shifted since earlier interviews. In the next moment, they tried to explain away discrepancies of their witnesses because of impairment and the passage of time.
Before questioning the witnesses, lawyers on both sides apologized for having to make them relive such an embarrassing period of their lives. They praised the witnesses for getting on the right track and being willing to tell the truth now 19 years later.
One witness, Barbara Ray, scolded the lawyers for digging into a past she was trying hard to hide from her children.
"You don't know what it's like having people show up all this time later and start asking about this kind of stuff while your children are standing in the yard," Ray said last week, fussing at Wake County Assistant District Attorney Tom Ford.
Impaired actors
Taylor and his drug partner, Johnny Beck, had ventured into Southeast Raleigh on Sept. 25, 1991, to buy some crack cocaine. Taylor had been drinking before they met up; Beck had already been smoking crack.
Thomas, a user who traded her body for crack, had a lethal level of drugs in her system when she was beaten to death, the medical examiner found.
In testifying last week, Taylor tried to contrast his drug use with his alcohol consumption.
"You don't clear right up, but you don't lose the motor skills like you do with alcohol," Taylor said. "You get an increased nervousness or paranoia. You are focused on the next hit."
The three judges hearing Taylor's case are left trying to understand how impaired each witness was the night of the murder and how it affected his or her observations and memories. Judges will have to sort through the witnesses' stories and examine the physical clues still left from that night.
The latter could be an easier task: No human blood was on Taylor, his clothes or his truck that night. A police canine that seemed to signal Thomas was in Taylor's truck that night was likely suggesting the exact opposite, an expert testified.
