Six witnesses called to open 2019 murder trial

ADRIAN — Opening arguments and six witnesses have started the trial in the 2019 gang-related murder of Christopher Dickerson.

The trial, which is expected to last three weeks, is taking place inside the Lenawee County Circuit Court courtroom of Judge Michael R. Olsaver.

Opening statements from the prosecution and the defense attorneys began Wednesday afternoon with witness testimony starting Thursday and continuing Friday. Because of Friday being Good Friday, the court was in session up until noon. Only one witness was on the stand Friday morning. The trial is scheduled to resume at 9 a.m. Monday.

Two jury panels are tasked with reviewing evidence and hearing testimony in the trial of Count Tereso the Almighty Trevino and Andrew Erin Cecil who are accused of ordering the death of Christopher Dickerson, who was shot to death Jan. 21, 2019, in a wooded area near Morenci. Stanley Sala and Christie Harrah are serving as the special public defenders for Cecil, and Jim Daly is the special public defender for Trevino. Both defendants requested separate trials.

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Lenawee County Prosecutor Jackie Wyse and Lenawee County Assistant Prosecutor Douglas Hartung are trying the case for the state.

The jury of 14 jurors for Cecil’s case is now down to 13 after Olsaver said Thursday one of the jurors was unable to commit to the timeframe of the trial due to a child care scheduling conflict that could not be resolved. Another panel of 14 jurors is hearing the case against Trevino.

While Cecil and Trevino are not accused of being the ones who shot Dickerson more than four years ago, the prosecution is seeking to prove they are the ones who ordered the murder and had a hand in aiding and abetting.

There are several people involved in the case who are associated with the Adrian-area Latin Counts gang and who have testified during the course of the case, Hartung said Wednesday during his opening statement.

Hartung described the Counts as a violent street gang in Lenawee County that is involved in the manufacture and sales of illegal drugs, home invasions and burglaries. He also stated Trevino was the leader of the gang in Lenawee County during the time when the events in this case took place.

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Two other men charged in connection with Dickerson’s death and another man who was incarcerated in the Lenawee County Jail with Cecil, testified in a preliminary examination that Trevino, as the head of the Latin Counts, and Cecil, as a member of the Counts, indicated they wanted Dickerson dead because of his expected testimony in Cecil's trial in January 2019 in a stabbing case. Cecil was accused of wounding Dickerson during a fight about a woman and stabbing him in the back.

In February 2020, a Lenawee County Circuit Court jury found Cecil guilty of assault with intent to commit great bodily harm in the stabbing case. He is serving 4 years and 9 months to 10 years in prison.

Dickerson, who is also associated with the Latin Counts, testified against Cecil on May 29, 2018, at a preliminary examination. A trial was scheduled for late January 2019.

The Counts, Hartung said, have rules and oaths, kind of like a brotherhood, which they are supposed to follow. One of those rules, he said, is no snitching on another gang member.

Because of Dickerson testifying against Cecil in the 2018 stabbing case, that constituted snitching, Hartung said.

In November 2018, Hartung said, Cecil and Trevino met with a man named Austin Richardson at the Lenawee County Jail where each of them was lodged. The conversation, Hartung said, consisted of figuring out ways to stop Dickerson from testifying against Cecil during the scheduled January 2019 trial.

“They told him that he (Dickerson) would be taken care of,” Hartung paraphrased regarding the alleged conversations between Cecil, Trevino and Richardson.

David Taylor, a fourth member of the Latin Counts, is also involved in the murder of Dickerson, Hartung said.

The eventual plan of killing Dickerson was put into motion on Jan. 21, 2019. Cecil’s trial date was set for Jan. 31, 2019. His scheduled final pretrial date from the stabbing case was scheduled for Jan. 25, 2019. Because of subpoena issues in getting Dickerson to appear in court for the trial, the Jan. 31 trial was adjourned and rescheduled for June 4, 2019.

Two vehicles, Hartung said, on Jan. 21, 2019, left the city of Adrian, and embarked for Hudson to attend a party at Richardson’s sister’s house. Dickerson was believed to be at the party. Drugs were being used and alcohol was being consumed, he said.

Dickerson, at some point during the night, was lured away from the party by Richardson and Taylor, Hartung said, under the guise of heading to a place south of Hudson on the way to Morenci, to “hit a lick,” a phrase used to describe a robbery or a burglary.

“That is what Richardson and that is what Taylor told Chris Dickerson on this evening,” Hartung said. “...Dickerson was told there would be drugs, money, maybe guns.”

In his opening statements, Hartung kept referring to the image of three people walking into a wooded area together and only two people walking out.

“Those would be the last steps (Chris) Dickerson would ever take,” Hartung said.

His body was not discovered until Feb. 23, 2019, by Adrian Police Detective Sgt. LaMar Rufner, who was the officer in charge of investigating the 2018 stabbing between Cecil and Dickerson.

Rufner, who was one of the five witnesses called on Thursday, said the body was located in Medina Township in rural, southwest Lenawee County. He sid he was directed to the discovery of the body at that location by Taylor.

Daly, during his opening statement Wednesday, agreed that Hartung’s retelling of the dates and the timeline of Cecil’s and Dickerson’s fight and the subsequent happenings were correct. The argument he wanted the juries to consider, he said, was that Taylor and Richardson are both lying about who did the murder. Both are pointing the finger at the other person, he said, and neither of them have been able to keep their stories straight when interviewed by police.

He referred to Taylor and Richardson as “crazed, depraved killers” who were “not thinking right” because of the amount of methamphetamines they had taken the night of Dickerson’s murder.

Sala, meanwhile, argued that in a recorded police video conference, Richardson said in relation to the Dickerson murder case, “I don’t know nothing about nothing.”

Richardson and Taylor, Sala agreed with Daly, both had conflicting stories about the murder during the preliminary examination.

Sala’s basis of his argument, he said, was that Cecil, his client, is charged with first-degree, premeditated murder but the charges against Richardson and Taylor have been reduced to second-degree murder, even though, he said, those two were the ones who were convicted of Dickerson’s murder.

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“You can see how this is a whim,” Sala said. “Everything they (the prosecution) are going to bring you is speculation. Everything they are going to bring you is ‘could be.’ ‘Maybe.’”

Regarding Cecil’s stabbing of Dickerson in 2018, Sala said the size difference between the two men — Dickerson estimated to be 6-foot-2 and Cecil standing about 5-foot-5 — was a matter of self-defense for the smaller Cecil.

“Don’t convict somebody who didn’t do anything wrong,” Sala said to the juries Wednesday.

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On Thursday, the first witness called to the stand by the prosecution was Tracy Dickerson, Chris’ mother. During her testimony, an image of Chris during his days at Hudson High School and as a member of the varsity football team was digitally displayed in the courtroom.

The last time she ever spoke with her son, she said, was in a video call for at least 15 to 20 minutes Jan. 19, 2019. Chris’ face, she said, was bruised and somewhat bloodied at the time of the call. On Feb. 18, she filed a missing person’s report with the Lenawee County Sheriff’s Office, which was five days before her son’s body was discovered.

Lenawee County Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Bader Cassin said Dickerson’s body was recovered frozen solid. It wasn’t until Feb. 28 that the body had nearly been completely thawed.

Four gunshot wounds were evident, he testified Thursday. The gunshot wounds, he explained, included three that were within millimeters of the head and neck region and a fourth that entered the waistline near the back at the right side of the spine. A toxicology report showed Dickerson had both meth and marijuana in his system at the time of his death.

Christopher Carden and DeAndrew Woodard, two men currently lodged at the Lenawee County Jail, were the other two witnesses called Thursday. On Friday, the only witness to take the stand was another current inmate, Juan Bosquez.

Carden and Bosquez have both associated themselves with the Latin Counts and are familiar with Cecil, Dickerson, Trevino, Richardson and Taylor as well as the rules customarily followed by the Counts. Bosquez said he and Taylor were best friends.

Woodard, however, said he did not identify as a member of the Latin Counts and before their time in jail together, he had no prior knowledge of who Cecil was.

This article originally appeared on The Daily Telegram: 6 witnesses called to open 2019 murder trial