Don't try to destroy evidence while the police watch you in a holding cell.

2017-M-357            State of Minnesota, Respondent, vs. Maurice Nathaniel Wilson, Appellant.

BACKGROUND:  Wilson was the leader of a heroin distribution ring which included Anthony Fairbanks and Maureen Onyelobi.  Fairbanks was arrested with heroin and his words led to the arrest and charging of Wilson.  On the day before Fairbanks was to testify against Wilson, Wilson called Onyelobi and ordered her to take care of “it.”

On March 8, 2014, Onyelobi rented a storage facility in Plymouth.  That afternoon, she was caught on a security tape as she moved a box and a duffel bag into the storage facility from a two-tone van.  Later that evening, Fairbanks called Onyelobi on a cell phone that federal agents had been tracking in the case.  Fairbanks allegedly told Onyelobi he would meet her on the street at the Little Earth housing project in Minneapolis.

A few minutes later, a witness heard several shots in the Little Earth neighborhood and saw a two-tone van pull away.  Fairbanks had been shot four times in the head at fairly close range, and four casings were recovered.

The next morning, the security camera showed Onyelobi move something from a two-toned van into Onyelobi’s security facility.

Police tracked the phone which Fairbanks had called to Onyelobi’s room at a Red Roof Inn in Plymouth, where they arrested her for possession of heroin.  When a charged accomplice opened the door to the room, police observed a large ball of what appeared to be contraband and proved to be heroin.   When Onyelobi returned to the room which was registered in her name, she was arrested for possession.

While Onyelobi was in custody, police watched her try to destroy the key to the security facility.  In the facility, police found the murder weapon with Fairbank’s tracers on the barrel and evidence that may have linked the gun to Onyelobi and a fourth member of the heroin ring.

In 2014, a jury found Onyelobi guilty of the first-degree premeditated murder of Fairbanks. The district court sentenced Onyelobi to life imprisonment without the possibility of release.

Following a jury trial, Wilson was convicted of both counts, and the district court sentenced him to life imprisonment without the possibility of release on Count I for premeditated intentional first-degree murder on a theory of accomplice liability.

HELD:  On this direct appeal, the Supreme Court affirmed Wilson’s conviction and sentence.

First, the district court did not clearly err by finding that appellant failed to make a prima facie showing that respondent had exercised a peremptory challenge to a potential juror on the basis of race.

Second, the district court did not abuse its discretion by excluding irrelevant evidence and speculative argument. Affirmed.

Anderson (Gildea, Stras, Lillehaug, Hudson, Chutich, and McKeig)

Date: August 16, 2017

[CRIME] [MURDER] [PREMEDITATED] [FIRST-DEGREE] [DRUGS]