Jurors began deliberating Tuesday in a first-degree murder case charging Cydrisse Alvin, who is also known as Meeka, with the June 2012 stabbing death of 28-year-old Amber Kent.
During the five-day trial, prosecutors argued that Alvin knocked on Kent’s door, came inside, and stabbed Kent three times in front of Kent’s boyfriend Lamarzs Wilson and her 6-year-old sleeping daughter.
But Alvin’s defense argued that Wilson was the person who actually stabbed Kent. And Wilson “forgot every fact that made him look guilty,” said Alvin’s defense attorney Anthony Matthews on Tuesday.
Kent was found on June 4, 2012 around 9:00 a.m. at her apartment in the 3400 block of 13th Place Southeast, suffering from apparent stab wounds. Kent was transported to a local hospital where she was pronounced dead.
Alvin is charged with first-degree murder while armed in connection with Kent’s death.
During closing arguments on Tuesday, Worm told jurors that defense attorneys included a sequence of events during opening statements that were “demonstrably false.” There was no evidence during trial of recovered drug paraphernalia or signs of a struggle between Kent and Wilson, Worm noted.
Instead, Worm said that the evidence shows that Alvin and Kent were feuding in the weeks before Kent’s death and that Alvin was in the apartment complex during the 10-minute span when Kent was stabbed.
Detective Anthony Patterson testified Tuesday that MPD surveillance footage captures a car belonging to Alvin’s mother arrive in front of 3402 13th Street Southeast on June 4, 2012, at approximately 8:51 a.m. In the video, a person exits the passenger side door, Patterson testified. Almost 10 minutes later, the video shows the vehicle leaving the area, traveling south on Congress Street. Other footage from the apartment building captures the same sequence, Patterson testified.
James Ford, Kent’s uncle, testified that Kent and Alvin were close friends who were constantly “bickering” in the months before Kent’s stabbing, including one argument over $40. Ford told jurors that on June 4, 2012, moments after he woke up, Wilson entered his bedroom with Kent’s daughter and said, “Call 911, Meeka just stabbed Amber!”
Kent’s former neighbor, Willie Harding, told jurors that he considered Kent a friend. Harding testified that Alvin lived on the third floor of the apartment building, along with himself and Kent, though he didn’t know Alvin well.
On June 4, 2012, “loud voices” woke Harding up, he testified. “I heard, ‘Why are you doing this? Stop!’ and the name ‘Meeka’ more than once.”
Harding said that he then opened his door, and saw someone going down the steps. “It was a female,” Harding said, later adding, “I thought it was Meeka.”
Connie Wilson, Kent’s neighbor and Lamarzs Wilson’s mother, testified that her son was “hollering and crying” when he came to her door on the morning on June 4, 2012.
Wilson asked her to check on Kent and left the building “to see if he could see where Meeka went,” she testified. Minutes later, as she waited in Kent’s apartment, Lamarzs Wilson returned, “hysterical,” she testified. When paramedics arrived at the apartment to attend to Kent, Lamarzs Wilson was “trying to hold her, embrace her,” Connie Wilson said.
The case is scheduled to continue deliberations tomorrow.
