Jury not back in Lewis case
By Gary Popp
Published in News on February 21, 2011 1:46 PM
After nearly seven hours of deliberation, the jury was still out today in the attempted murder trial of Mack Recardo Lewis.
The jury deliberated for about three hours on Thursday and another four hours on Friday before Judge Arnold Jones suspended deliberation until this morning.
The jury has made some progress, however.
The foreman informed the court late Friday that verdicts had been reached on two of the three counts. The unresolved count was undecided at 11-1, she said.
Lewis faces charges of first-degree burglary, assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill or inflict serious injury and a second, less severe assault charge.
Lewis, 27, is accused of assaulting his former girlfriend, Gloria Peacock, on Nov. 9, 2009 at her home in the Hood Swamp community.
He allegedly broke into her home and stabbing her several times.
Mrs. Peacock's five children, two whom were fathered by Lewis, were home at the time.
The trial began a week ago with Charles Gurley as the defense attorney and Assistant District Attorney Paige Rouse as prosecutor.
Gurley's has made a number of motions to suppress evidence and also requested a mistrial because of certain language used by a witness in front of the jury. The many procedural motions have kept jurors filing back and forth from the jury room to the jury box throughout the past week.
Both Mrs. Peacock and Lewis have taken the witness stand, where they offered differing accounts of what happened before Mrs. Peacock was taken to Wayne Memorial Hospital with puncture wounds to her stomach and back and cuts to her fingers.
The trial has also included the testimonies of several officers with the Wayne County Sheriff's Office, including Dec. Sgt. Rick Farfour, Det. Sgt. Larry Mitchell and Det. Sgt. Robert Chunn and Deputy Randy Thompson.