Tag: Courts

A Paola, Kansas, woman was sentenced Thursday to more than 11 in federal prison for methamphetamine trafficking, U.S. Attorney Stephen McAllister said.

April Lunsford, 39, Paola, Kansas, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine.

The case began when the Kansas Bureau of Investigation started looking into a trafficking organization that was distributing methamphetamine in the Kansas City, Kansas, area, according to the U.S. attorney’s office. Lunsford sold methamphetamine four times to buyers working undercover for law enforcement, according to a spokesman.

During the investigation, Lunsford was arrested and charged in Miami County District Court in connection with the death of 23-year-old Heather Briggs. Lunsford pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and was sentenced to more than eight years in state prison.

McAllister commended the KBI, the FBI and Assistant U.S. Attorney Sheri Catania for their work on the case.

The Kansas Supreme Court today upheld the convictions of Cecil Meggerson and Charles Bowser in the shooting of Wyandotte County Deputy Scott Wood.

Deputy Wood was at a 7-Eleven convenience store at 43rd and Shawnee Drive on March 4, 2015, when it was robbed by three men. The robbers brandished guns and demanded money. The deputy suffered gunshot wounds to his jaw, left and right shoulders, left chest and the right side of his neck, according to court documents. Deputy Wood recovered, and since then has taken medical retirement because of the injuries.

There had been a string of violent robberies throughout the Kansas City area prior to the 7-Eleven robbery, according to court documents.

On direct appeal, the Supreme Court affirmed Meggerson’s several criminal convictions in Wyandotte County District Court, including the attempted capital murder of Deputy Wood.

In an opinion written by Justice Caleb Stegall, the court held the state presented sufficient evidence to convict Meggerson of attempted capital murder and Meggerson waived his other sufficiency claims because he failed to argue them. Also, the Supreme Court waived Meggerson’s claim a search warrant was defective because Meggerson failed to provide necessary documents.

In addition, the Supreme Court held the district court properly admitted Meggerson’s jail phone calls because the state laid sufficient foundation for the calls.

The Supreme Court also held the district court properly admitted prior crimes evidence about other robberies because the evidence went to identity, raising a reasonable inference Meggerson committed those robberies and the prior crimes evidence was not unduly prejudicial and admissible.

Further, the Supreme Court held the district court did not abuse its discretion when it admitted two timelines as evidence because the timelines focused on different evidence and were not cumulative. Finding no trial errors, the cumulative error doctrine did not apply, according to the Supreme Court.

In the Bowser case, the court found only one harmless error, and affirmed the conviction.

The court’s decision on Meggerson is online at https://www.kscourts.org/KSCourts/media/KsCourts/Opinions/117131.pdf?ext=.pdf.

The court’s decision on Bowser is online at https://www.kscourts.org/KSCourts/media/KsCourts/Opinions/120350.pdf?ext=.pdf.

The Kansas Supreme Court today upheld a murder conviction from Wyandotte County, while overturning a provision ordering lifetime postrelease.

A Wyandotte County jury convicted Loviss Todd on charges of felony murder, aggravated robbery, aggravated battery, and aggravated assault. Todd was convicted of the December 2008 murder of Vincent Green.

On direct appeal to the Kansas Supreme Court, Todd challenged the jury instructions, claimed prosecutorial misconduct, and contended that cumulative error denied him a fair trial. Todd also challenged the district court judge’s imposition of lifetime postrelease supervision as part of his life sentence. The court affirmed Todd’s convictions and sentence, with the exception of the provision ordering lifetime postrelease.

The court identified error with the district judge’s failure to instruct the jury on the caution it should exercise in evaluating an accomplice witness’ testimony, but held the error was harmless. The court also held that the district judge should not have instructed the jury that the degree of certainty expressed by an eyewitness is a factor to be weighed in assessing reliability of the identification. But, because the eyewitnesses in this case did not express a degree of certainty on the identification of Todd, the instruction was not clearly erroneous.

The court held that retroactive application of the 2013 amendments made in a state law, which eliminated lesser included offenses of felony murder and expressly provided for retroactive application to cases pending on appeal, does not violate the federal ex post facto clause. Accordingly, Todd was not entitled to a second-degree murder instruction.

The court rejected Todd’s claims of prosecutorial misconduct and cumulative error. The state conceded that Todd’s lifetime postrelease supervision portion of his sentence was improper, and the court vacated that portion of his sentence.

To read the decision, visit http://www.kscourts.org/Cases-and-Opinions/opinions/SupCt/2014/20140425/106021.pdf.