IAPE Evidence Blog

World Pub­lish­ing Co., Tulsa World, tulsaworld.com
BYLINE: Staff Reports
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Tulsa, OK

Phillip Anthony Summers 

A Tulsa man who pre­vi­ously was sen­tenced to die in a double-murder case pleaded guilty Wednes­day to a reduced charge in the case, which was affected by the unavail­abil­ity of a key piece of evi­dence for a retrial.

Phillip Anthony Sum­mers, 26, pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree mur­der linked to the Feb­ru­ary 2004 killings of Shelly and Ples Vann Jr., who were each shot three times in their home at 38 E. 50th Place North.

In accor­dance with a plea agree­ment, Tulsa County Dis­trict Judge William Kel­lough imposed two 30-year sen­tences, which will be treated as one 30-year term for prison purposes.

That state court sen­tence for mur­der also will run con­cur­rently with Sum­mers’ fed­eral prison term of 54 years in other cases.

Attor­neys said it is expected that Sum­mers will serve his sen­tence in a fed­eral prison and not in the Okla­homa Depart­ment of Corrections.

Jurors in 2008 found Sum­mers guilty of two counts of first-degree mur­der for the Vanns’ deaths.

But in 2010, the state Court of Crim­i­nal Appeals granted a new trial, revers­ing those con­vic­tions and death sentences.

The appel­late opin­ion said Sum­mers’ right to a fair trial was vio­lated when then-District Judge Tom Thorn­brugh did not let a wit­ness tes­tify in sup­port of Sum­mers’ “alter­na­tive per­pe­tra­tor” defense.

Before a retrial could be held, a Tulsa Police Depart­ment error led to the destruc­tion of a hand­gun that pros­e­cu­tors said was a mur­der weapon in the case.

Tulsa County Dis­trict Attor­ney Tim Har­ris said the inad­ver­tent destruc­tion of that gun left pros­e­cu­tors with­out the evi­den­tiary use of “the mur­der weapon we believe was used by Phillip Summers.”

That was the “one piece of direct evi­dence that ties Sum­mers to the death scene,” Har­ris said previously.

Sum­mers waived his right to a retrial Wednes­day, and Har­ris dropped the death-penalty request.

In plead­ing guilty to the reduced charge of second-degree mur­der, Sum­mers took respon­si­bil­ity for the deaths of the Vanns, defense attor­ney Stan Mon­roe said.

In a doc­u­ment signed by the defen­dant, sub­mit­ted in sup­port of his guilty plea, Sum­mers indi­cated that while in the com­mis­sion of an assault and in the course of dis­charg­ing a firearm with an intent to injure the Vanns, he caused their deaths.

In Feb­ru­ary, Tulsa County First Assis­tant Dis­trict Attor­ney Doug Drum­mond filed notice that Sum­mers could tes­tify as a pros­e­cu­tion wit­ness in mur­der cases involv­ing the 2008 killing of Tulsa busi­ness­man Neal Sweeney.

In court Wednes­day, Drum­mond said the plea agree­ment with Sum­mers in the Vann case was not related to any coop­er­a­tion by Sum­mers in the Sweeney case.

Sweeney, 63, was fatally shot in 2008 at his busi­ness, Retail Fuels Mar­ket­ing, 3158 S. 108th East Ave. One man has pleaded guilty, and three oth­ers are await­ing sep­a­rate tri­als in that case.

Sum­mers’ poten­tial tes­ti­mony at tri­als in the Sweeney case has him cat­e­go­rized as a jail­house infor­mant, a court doc­u­ment indicates.

At a hear­ing Wednes­day, Sum­mers said he hoped to get “pos­si­ble con­sid­er­a­tion’’ in his fed­eral cases but that “noth­ing is guaranteed.”

In fed­eral court, Sum­mers has been sen­tenced to 33 years in prison in con­nec­tion with an unsuc­cess­ful plot to kill Sgt. Mike Huff, a now-retired Tulsa police homi­cide detec­tive. That term runs con­sec­u­tively with a 21-year prison sen­tence Sum­mers got in 2008 for his role in a con­spir­acy to dis­trib­ute crack cocaine and marijuana.

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org

Poin­sett County Demo­c­rat Tri­bune, democrattribune.com
BYLINE:
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Tru­mann, AR

Tru­mann police inves­ti­ga­tor Erik Will­banks was fired March 7 fol­low­ing an inves­ti­ga­tion into for­mer Police Chief Tony’s Rusher use of pre­scrip­tion drugs from the department’s evi­dence room.

Will­banks was sus­pended two weeks with­out pay on Feb. 28 after the results of the inves­ti­ga­tion were released. On March 6, at a spe­cial meet­ing of the Tru­mann city coun­cil, alder­men voted unan­i­mously to sup­port Mayor Sheila Wal­ters in what­ever deci­sion she decided to take regard­ing Willbanks.

Wal­ters fired Will­banks after con­sid­er­ing tes­ti­mony he gave to pri­vate inves­ti­ga­tor and for­mer Arkansas State Trooper Phil Carter.

Accord­ing to Carter’s report, Will­banks said he first noticed Rusher had a prob­lem as far back as two years ago when Rusher went into the evi­dence room alone and took some hydrocodone that matched his prescription.

“Will­banks said he was not sure of the pro­ce­dures for going into the evi­dence room,” the report says, “but the chief was with him and said it was okay. Will­banks said he fig­ured this is the way it had always been done.”

Will­banks also said in the report that Rusher approached him “10 to 15 times and asked if he had any hydrocodone that had been through court.”

“The chief would either go into the evi­dence room and get the drugs or have me go in and get them,” he said. “Every sin­gle time he would ask if the drugs had already been through court. It finally got to where I would tell him there were no drugs left in evi­dence that had not been through court.”

Carter’s report also states that Will­banks felt an oblig­a­tion to coop­er­ate with the for­mer chief, not­ing “Will­banks said he was not made aware of any set rules about the evi­dence room. He said he felt oblig­ated to coop­er­ate when the chief of police told him to do something.”

In Jan­u­ary, Will­banks told Assis­tant Chief Gary Henry about what was going on with Rusher. They went to the state police about the mat­ter, and Dis­trict Pros­e­cut­ing Attor­ney Scott Elling­ton sug­gested Mayor Wal­ters con­duct an inter­nal investigation.

Now that Carter’s inves­ti­ga­tion is com­plete, the mat­ter has been turned over to the state police. Elling­ton has asked the ASP to con­duct a crim­i­nal inves­ti­ga­tion into the alle­ga­tions against Rusher. 

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org

Bay City Tele­vi­sion, Inc., XETV San Diego6-The CW, sandiego6.com
BYLINE:
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Carls­bad, CA

A nar­cotics detec­tive accused of theft and drug pos­ses­sion is set to be arraigned Friday.

Michael Koch was arrested in Jan­u­ary after two employ­ees saw him steal­ing drugs from the evi­dence room at the Carls­bad Police Department.

Koch had heroin on him at the time of his arrest, accord­ing to court documents.

The for­mer police offi­cer has been charged with felony bur­glary and felony pos­ses­sion of a con­trolled substance.

If con­victed, he faces up to nearly 4 years in a state prison.

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Inter­na­tional Asso­ci­a­tion for Prop­erty and Evi­dence
“Law Enforce­ment Serv­ing the Needs of Law Enforce­ment”
www.IAPE.org