Curtis D. Patterson | Homicide Watch DC

Curtis Patterson Sentenced to 11 1/2 Years In Angelo Jones Murder Case

Rebecca Zisser — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 10:16:58 -0400

Curtis Patterson was sentenced today to 11 1/2 years in prison for obstruction of justice and gun possession in connection with the October 2010 shooting death of Angelo Jones.

At sentencing, Patterson told Judge Thomas Motley that he was just following the "rules of the street" when he gave his cousin the gun used to shoot Jones.

Motley also sentenced Patterson to three years of supervised release following his jail sentence. In those three years he will be required to obtain his GED and attend parenting classes.

Patterson was charged with first-degree murder in Oct. 2011 as a co-defendant in Rickey Pharr's murder case.

According to the government’s evidence presented at Pharr’s trial, on Oct. 2, 2010, Pharr encountered Jones at a craps game near Dix Street in Northeast DC. Pharr believed that Jones was an informant to police.

Prosecutor Reagan Taylor told jurors at trial that after Pharr saw Jones at the game, he asked Patterson for a gun. Patterson gave it to him, Taylor said.

Patterson was scheduled to stand trial with Pharr, but the cases were severed just days before the February trial.

Patterson pled guilty in March to illegal possession of a firearm and obstruction of justice. His cousin and co-defendant, Rickey Pharr, was convicted of first-degree murder in February and sentenced to 40 years in prison in April.

A proffer, which Patterson told the court was true, states that Pharr told Patterson about an argument he had with Jones and Pharr asked Patterson for a gun. But Patterson refused to give him one. Later on, Patterson obtained a gun and gave it to Pharr.

The proffer also states that Patterson was interviewed by police and subpoenaed after Jones’ death. While under oath before the Grand Jury, Patterson lied about being asked for a gun, the proffer states.

Defense Attorney's Absence Delays Curtis Patterson Sentencing Twice

Laura Amico — Fri, 25 May 2012 14:26:09 -0400

Twice this month Curtis Patterson has been brought before the court for sentencing, only to be sent back to the cell block without a sentence because his attorney has been absent.

Patterson, 23, pled guilty in March to illegal possession of a firearm and obstruction of justice in connection with the shooting death of Angelo Jones.

The government has asked that Patterson be sentenced to eleven and a half years in prison.

He entered the plea just three weeks before his trial date. He was charged in Oct. 2011 with seven counts connected to the case, including one count of first-degree murder while armed. His co-defendant, Rickey Pharr, was convicted of first-degree murder on Feb. 29. Pharr was sentenced to 40 years in prison.

A new sentencing date, the third, has been set for June 13 at 9:15 a.m.

Correction: An earlier version of this article read "Jones was sentenced to 40 years in prison." It should have read "Pharr was sentenced to 40 years in prison."

The 911 Call Before the Gunshots: Could Angelo Jones have been Saved?

Laura Amico — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 23:28:42 -0400

In Clay Terrace the shots ring out, first one: bang. Then over and over again. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang.

"You heard that?" a young man asks a 911 operator.

"Yes, I heard it," she says. "I heard it."

That shooting, recorded in a 911 call early in the morning of Oct. 2, 2010, killed 31-year-old Angelo Jones, a father of two and rumored neighborhood "snitch."

He was shot six times in the back. When emergency responders arrived, they found him fallen to the ground of the Clay Terrace parking lot where the shooting had taken place.

The 911 recording, which captured more than five minutes of a witness's conversation with the operator before the shots rang out, was prime evidence in the trial against Rickey Pharr last month.

In closing arguments Prosecutor Reagan Taylor asked the jury to remember the call.

“You heard the six shots that killed Angelo Jones,” she said. “As you heard those shots you heard [the witness] telling you who the shooter was.”

Pharr was ultimately found guilty of first-degree murder while armed in Jones' death.

While Jones' family has taken solace in the conviction, they say the 911 call is also evidence that Jones' death could have been prevented.

"When I heard the 911 call I was dismayed," said Jones' sister, Aisha Jones. "I was shocked and truly hurt. This person is trying to prevent my brother from getting shot and gunned down, but to what effect?"

The caller, a young man who ultimately testified about Jones' murder, said he called 911 in order to prevent the shooting from happening. Community leaders and some in law enforcement say that had the call been handled differently, he could have been successful, that the shooting could have been prevented.

A Good Address

On Oct. 1, 2010 Jones, known to family and friends as "Lochie," was playing craps in a parking lot off of Dix Street Northeast. It was a Friday night and he played past midnight into the early hours of Saturday morning. He wore a track jacket and blue jeans, his face highlighted with "personality glasses," non-prescription frames worn for style.

Lots of people were out that night in Clay Terrace: there were fifty or sixty people hanging around the parking lot craps game, and others were sitting on the porches of nearby apartments. When Pharr showed up at the craps game with a gun, one of those people called 911.

911 operator: Hello?

Caller: Yeah, I need DC police.

911 operator: Where?

Caller: I'm around Clay Terrace.

911 operator: What's the location sir?

Caller: I'm... 5339. In the back of 5339. I’m talking low because I’m like in the crowd.

911 operator: Ok. 5339. What street?

Caller: It’s ah, 53rd Street.... (silence)... hello?

But the 911 operator can't find that address.

He tries to tell her, again and again where he is. Clay Terrace. 53rd Street. 54th Street. The number 300 is on the street sign. The house number is 5339. He can see the H.D. Woodson construction nearby. But two of the addresses he gives, 5335 53rd St NE and 5335 54th St NE, don't exist.

"Now they’re getting into an altercation," he tells the 911 operator.

5335 54th Street, he says again.

911 operator: That’s not a good address.

Caller: That’s what I’m right behind though. Like, right on the corner. That’s what it say on the corner. 53rd and it say thats the house where I’m by. There’s two police cars right here.

911 operator: It’s not coming up as a good address in the computer, sir.

Caller: Well, if you could come, Clay Terrace, right-

911 operator: Sir, I’m not coming.

Caller: Nah, I’m just saying, I know you’re the dispatcher. I’m just saying like you need to send some officers.

For five and a half minutes the caller and 911 call taker go back and forth in this manner. Then gunshots. Sirens. And Jones is dead.

Caller: You heard that?

911 operator: Yes. I heard it. I heard it.

Caller: That’s why I’m trying to tell you all to come quick.

Pharr, 28, was found guilty of first-degree murder while armed at a trial last month. When the young man who placed the 911 call reluctantly took the stand as a government witness he listened as his eight-minute call for help was played for the jury.

“All I wanted to do was prevent the incident from happening,” he testified. “I was just trying to prevent the whole scenario, Angelo getting killed and someone going to jail and all.”

The Streets of Clay Terrace

A total of six locations or landmarks were given by the caller to the 911 operator before Jones was shot, all within about a square mile of each other in Northeast DC. All were within a quarter mile of where Jones was found.

View 911 Call in a larger map

People familiar with the neighborhood, including MPD officers and community leaders interviewed for this story, said that while the call did not pin down a specific usable address, the caller's descriptions were clear enough to give a general sense of where a crime was about to occur.

For those less familiar with the neighborhood, it's possible to put the locations into Google Maps for a rough estimate of the streets the caller is describing. All but one of those locations fall within a four block section of Clay Terrace.

"5400 block and 5300 block, police could have just went through the alleys went through the blocks," said Ron Moten, co-founder of Peaceoholics. "There's someone out there with a gun, that's like you know a Code Blue, you respond to the emergency. He was trying to stop a crime and the system didn't work. That is horrible and could have been prevented."

It's impossible to know what could have been different that night, what set of circumstances then could have meant Jones being alive now.

Jennifer Greene, director of the Office of Unified Communications, the intake center for the District's 911 calls, said that system upgrades put in place since Oct. 2010 could have helped in the Clay Terrace shooting. Those upgrades, she said, allow 911 operators to enter dispatch locations by searching landmarks. When the caller mentioned that he could see H.D. Woodson High School, the 911 operator could enter that location as a landmark, Greene said. But those upgrades weren't in place in 2010.

But even with the system OUC used in 2010, the 911 operator could have done more to find out where the young man was calling from, Greene said.

"She was trying to put in 5339 53rd street, which is not a good address in the system," Greene said of the operator. "In her efforts to try to find a good location she kept trying to use that address with 53rd or 54th street; she probably should have asked for a cross street."

Metropolitan Police Chief Cathy Lanier declined to comment about the call, saying that OUC did not come under her purview.

A source familiar with the call said that after hearing the recording, MPD made an official complaint to OUC about the operator's handling of the call. Greene, who took leadership of OUC three months after the Clay Terrace shooting, said she was unaware of the status any complaints, if there were any at all, made in relation to this specific case.

Greene said the operator's statement that she was "not coming" to help was "unprofessional," and that the call was "certainly not something that I would have liked to have seen or heard."

Pharr's Defense Attorney, Jason Downs, said it was "incompetent" and "rude."

Prosecutor Reagan Taylor told the jury, "It was inexcusable. It is a sad reflection of what one would hope for when they call for help."

But it's Aisha Jones who's most angry about what she heard in that young man's 911 call for help.

"My brother could still be alive," she said. "This murder could have been prevented."

Listen to the 911 call by clicking the orange arrow in the audio player below.

Curtis Patterson Pleads "Guilty" to Weapons, Obstruction Charges in Death of Angelo Jones

Laura Amico — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 13:53:53 -0400

Curtis Patterson pled guilty last week to illegal possession of a firearm and obstruction of justice in connection with the shooting death of Angelo Jones.

Patterson was charged in Oct. 2011 with seven counts connected to the case, including one count of first-degree murder while armed. His co-defendant, Rickey Pharr, was convicted of first-degree murder on Feb. 29.

Patterson was scheduled to stand trial with Pharr, but the cases were severed just days before trial.

According to the government’s evidence presented at Pharr's trial, on Oct. 2, 2010, Pharr encountered Jones at a craps game near Dix Street in Northeast DC. Pharr believed that Jones was an informant to police.

Prosecutor Reagan Taylor told jurors that once Pharr had seen Jones, he asked Patterson for a gun. Patterson gave it to him, Taylor said.

The proffer also states that Patterson was interviewed by police and subpoenaed after Jones' death. While under oath before the Grand Jury, Patterson lied about being asked for a gun, the proffer states.

Patterson is scheduled for sentencing May 11.

Plea documents are below.

Dix Street Murder Case is "Huge Embarrassment to the Government," Rickey Pharr's Defense Attorney Says

Laura Amico — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 20:21:09 -0500

Jurors in the murder case against Rickey Pharr are expected to begin deliberating tomorrow on a case that Pharr's defense attorney on Monday called "a huge embarrassment to the government."

According to the government's evidence presented at trial and summarized in closing statements Monday afternoon, on Oct. 2, 2010, Pharr encountered Angelo Jones at a craps game near Dix Street in Northeast DC. Pharr believed that Jones was an informant to police, an allegation that, attorneys on both sides said, could lead to death in some neighborhoods.

Prosecutor Regan Taylor told jurors that once Pharr had seen Jones, he asked Curtis Patterson, a former co-defendant in the case, for a gun. Patterson gave it to him, Taylor said.

One of the people gathered for the craps game and partying on Dix Street that night called 911 to ask for help. But for about five minutes the dispatcher struggled to determine where the young man was calling from. Then, while the young man attempted to find another address to give the dispatcher, gunshots were heard in the background. The witness described the shooter to the dispatcher: a black male with a long beard.

On Monday Taylor reminded the jury of that call.

"You heard the six shots that killed Angelo Jones," she said. "As you heard those shots you heard [the witness] telling you who the shooter was."

Taylor contends that Pharr matched that physical description the night of the shooting.

After the shooting, Taylor said, Pharr left the parking lot, cutting through Marvin Gaye Park on his way back to Lincoln Heights, dropping the gun in the trash on his way.

A witness testified that about five minutes after hearing gunshots, she saw a pickup truck pull into the Lincoln Heights neighborhood and Pharr got out of the passenger side. He told the woman he had "slumped," or killed, someone, she told the court Thursday, then he took off his hat and shirt and gave them to her.

Of the killing, the woman said Pharr told her a "boy" pulled out a knife, then Patterson passed Pharr a gun and Pharr shot the "boy." She said Pharr said he threw the gun in a trash can in Marvin Gaye Park. Pharr, Patterson, the woman and her friend then walked to the park to get the gun, she said. They retrieved it and Pharr asked the woman to hold on to it for him, she said. She returned it to him the next night.

"I didn't know what to do with it," she said, adding that she also threw away Pharr's t-shirt. The gun has not been found by MPD.

That lack of a gun, or any other physical evidence, is one of many flaws in the governments' case, Jason Downs, Pharr's defense attorney, said Monday in closing arguments.

Downs told the jury that Pharr is innocent. Someone else shot Jones, he said, and the government "paid and pressured" witnesses to point the finger at Pharr.

"You get what you pay for," he said, telling jurors of how the government paid for a hotel for four months for one witness, then gave her money for a down payment on a new apartment.

"She didn't come in here to tell the truth," Downs said of that witness. "She came into this courtroom to repay the government."

Downs said other witnesses were pressured by MPD detectives and the court itself. Detective Konstantinos Giannakoulias told the court that he had received text messages from a witness in the case concerned about his safety. On the stand, that witness said that Giannakoulias had initiated the texting with a message shortly after the witness failed to identify Pharr in a photo line-up. The witness said he felt pressured in the exchange.

Another witness said that before going into the grand jury, a detective talked to him about "jail time," Downs said, adding that one witness only testified to the grand jury when a judge ordered him to do so.

Why would the government go to such lengths to close a case? Downs asked the jury.

"This case is a huge embarrassment to the government," he said, answering his own question.

According to the defense, the night Jones was killed, eight police officers were sitting at the top of a hill near Dix Street in Clay Terrace, looking down on the parking lot where Jones would be shot. Fifty to sixty people people were partying down there, in what officers called "the hole," Downs said, and the smell of marijuana wafted up to them.

"The detectives did nothing," Downs said. "Either you have eight police officers too scared to go down into the hole, or they didn't care," Downs said. "But it gets worse. You heard that 911 call."

"She's not only incompetent, she's rude," Downs said of the dispatcher.

Taylor, the prosecutor, did not dispute that the 911 call was unfortunate.

"It was inexcusable," she said. "It is a sad reflection of what one would hope for when they call for help. But the dispatcher is not the one on trial."

As to the witnesses who testified, Taylor said they were "no friend of the government."

"'Hot' means 'snitch.' 'Hot' means that you talk to police. 'Hot' means that you come to court. 'Hot' means that you testify. Being a snitch is dangerous."

Those who testified likely knew that already, all too well, Taylor said. One, she said, "was freaked out about becoming what Angelo Jones was being called."

The trial has been marked by fits and starts. The jury was seated Feb. 16, a Thursday, and heard opening arguments that day. During the next five days of testimony, Judge Thomas Motley held about a dozen bench conferences, excusing the jury for ten minutes to several hours for each. On Monday, as Taylor was nearing the end of her closing arguments, a fire alarm forced the evacuation of the courthouse and delayed the trial by about an hour.

Prosecutors are scheduled to make a rebuttal closing statement around 10 a.m., and then the case will go to the jury: a panel nine women and five men (including alternates).

Witness recounts hiding gun, T-shirt for Pharr

Lindsey Anderson — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 21:56:16 -0500

A 22-year-old witness who says she held Rickey Pharr’s gun, T-shirt and hat after he allegedly shot Angelo Jones took the stand today in the first-degree murder trial against Pharr.

The witness, a friend of Pharr’s, said she was drinking a cup of champagne on a front porch in Lincoln Heights with a friend when they heard gunshots coming from the direction of the Clay Terrace neighborhood.

A pickup truck pulled into the Lincoln Heights neighborhood about five minutes after the shooting, the woman told the jury, and Pharr got out of the passenger side. He told the woman he had “slumped,” or killed, someone, she said, then he took off his hat and shirt and gave them to her.

“It just happened so quick. I just grabbed it and took it in the house,” she said.

Pharr, Curtis Patterson and a third person were outside when the witness returned.

Of the killing, the woman said Pharr told her a “boy” pulled out a knife, then Patterson passed Pharr a gun and Pharr shot the “boy." She said Pharr said he threw the gun in a trash can in Marvin Gaye Park. Pharr, Patterson, the woman and her friend then walked to the park to get the gun, she said. They retrieved it and Pharr asked the woman to hold on to it for him, she said. She returned it to him the next night.

“I didn’t know what to do with it,” she said, adding that she also threw away Pharr's T-shirt.

At trial Thursday, a near-indecipherable recorded phone conversation between Pharr and the woman was played. In the call Pharr asks her if she has met with his lawyer and asks her to tell the lawyer that he was in Lincoln Heights during the shooting. The woman said she didn’t want to lie, and that she set up an appointment with Pharr's attorney but never went to it.

The government later subpoenaed her and she received immunity for her involvement in the crime in exchange for her testimony. But, she told the court, she felt unsafe as a government witness.

After testifying before the grand jury, she said, her mother outed her as a "snitch." She was pregnant at the time and said she didn’t feel safe living in Lincoln Heights. The government then paid $139 a night for her to stay at a hotel for four months and provided her with $1,500, Pharr's attorney said. The woman said the money was for food.

The trial will resume Monday at 9:30 a.m. Judge Thomas Motley said he expects the jury to begin deliberation by Tuesday.

Despite Delays, Rickey Pharr Murder Trial Underway

Laura Amico — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 21:12:35 -0500

A first degree murder trial for Rickey Pharr is underway, despite continuing disagreements between the government and Pharr's defense attorney over evidence and witnesses.

The trial, which was scheduled to begin last Monday, has been marked by fits and starts. Before jury selection last week, Pharr's case was severed from that of his co-defendant, Curtis Patterson. Other motions further delayed the case. A jury was seated Thursday afternoon and opening arguments were heard then.

Pharr, 28, is suspected of fatally shooting Angelo Jones during or near a craps game in Southeast D.C. in October 2010. According to the government's evidence, Pharr said, before the shooting, that Jones was "hot," i.e. a government informant.

Testimony Tuesday morning was delayed when Pharr's attorney, Jason Downs, told Judge Thomas Motley that he had asked the U.S. Attorney's Office whether Jones was, in fact, an informant. The office told him that Jones was not, Downs said.

But when witnesses Tuesday were expected to address Jones' relationship with the government, Taylor told the court that Jones was, in fact, in touch with detectives and prosecutors. He was providing relevant information about a case, but he was not officially considered an informant, she said.

Downs opposed testimony about Jones' status, saying that had he known that Jones was cooperating with law enforcement he would have sought out other people present at the shooting who might have had that as a motive to kill Jones.

Court adjourned Tuesday awaiting Motley's decision on whether and how evidence of Jones' alleged cooperation with law enforcement could be pursued.

Rickey Pharr and Curtis Patterson to Stand Trial Monday in SE DC Shooting Death of Angelo Jones

Laura Amico — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 23:37:52 -0500

Two men accused of taking part in fatal shooting during a craps game in Southeast DC are expected to stand trial Monday.

Judge Thomas Motley on Tuesday ordered government and defense attorneys to be ready for trial Monday morning. Defense counsel for one of the defendants, Curtis Patterson, had argued at the last several status hearings to postpone the trial. Motley refused, saying that his trial calendar for the year was already filled and that a continuance would inordinately delay the case.

Angelo Jones, known as “Lochie,” was shot multiple times in the early morning hours of Oct. 2. At a preliminary hearing, MPD Homicide Detective James Wilson testified that according to a witness, Jones was playing craps with a group of people in a parking lot off of Dix St. when Rickey Pharr approached the group and accused Jones of cooperating with law enforcement in a criminal investigation.

Pharr was arrested in November 2010 on suspicion of first-degree murder while armed. Curtis Patterson was indicted in connection with the case in October 2011. The indictment charged Patterson lied to the Grand Jury twice about Jones' death, once saying that the night Jones was killed Pharr never asked him for a weapon and once saying that the night Jones was killed he never gave Pharr a weapon.

The indictment alleges that Pharr did in fact ask Patterson for a weapon, that Patterson gave Pharr a gun, and that Pharr used that gun to shoot and kill Jones.

Man Charged with Lying to Grand Jury Added as Co-Defendant in Angelo Jones Murder Case

Laura Amico — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 18:29:32 -0400

A D.C. man accused of lying to the Grand Jury in a murder investigation has now been charged with first-degree murder as a co-defendant in the case.

Curtis Patterson, 23, was indicted last Friday on seven charges in connection with the shooting death of Angelo Jones in October 2010. Patterson appeared in court today with his codefendant, Rickey Pharr, who was arraigned on a superseding indictment in the case.

The indictment against both men alleges that in a Grand Jury inquiry Patterson lied to the court twice, once saying that the night Jones was killed Pharr never asked him for a weapon and once saying that the night Jones was killed he never gave Pharr a weapon.

The indictment alleges that Pharr did in fact ask Patterson for a weapon, that Patterson gave Pharr a gun, and that Pharr used that gun to shoot and kill Jones.

Both men have pleaded innocent to the charges.

A trial date has been set for Nov. 14.

The indictment, and Patterson's notice of indictment, are below.