Defense says confession to 2010 Cape Girardeau shooting is false

POPLAR BLUFF, Mo. -- An attorney representing an Illinois man accused of shooting a Cape Girardeau man to death in June 2010 alleges that police pressured his client into confessing.

Thomas Evans is accused of killing Matthew Ervin at North Fountain Street and Park Drive in Cape Girardeau on June 26, 2010. In the days following the crime, he confessed to investigators that he shot Ervin in self-defense.

Evans' trial started Wednesday morning with jury selection, and opening statements by the defense and prosecution began in the early afternoon. The jury was selected from a pool of about 60 potential jurors. The trial is being held in Butler County on a change of venue. Evans is charged with second-degree murder and armed criminal action.

Evans' attorney, Daniel Moore, said in his opening statement that police employed tactics like cornering Evans in the interrogation room and giving him false information to goad the confession out of him. Moore said the confession is not true and that an unknown shooter emerged that morning and shot Ervin twice -- once in the chest and once in the head.

Moore said Evans denied shooting Ervin in the first two interviews but made the false confession in the third and final interview. Evans told police Ervin made threats and appeared to be retrieving a gun from his vehicle, so Evans fired two shots at the victim out of self-defense, Moore said.

Dr. Russell Deidiker, the Farmington, Mo., forensic pathologist who performed Ervin's autopsy, testified that, because of the way he was shot in the chest initially, there was no way Ervin was reaching into the car.

The interviews were recorded on video, but the sound on the device was faulty. Moore provided two still shots from the interview that show Evans in a corner and two officers speaking to him. Moore said the tactics persuaded Evans to fabricate the story because he is uneducated and unsophisticated.

"It doesn't take a genius to convince him," Moore said.

Cape Girardeau County Prosecuting Attorney Morley Swingle said in his opening statements that Evans shot Ervin twice and DNA evidence from a key found in Ervin's car and blood on Evans' shoes will help prove his case.

Area major case squad member Scott Stoelting said he helped search Ervin's car, where a set of keys was found in the rear passenger seat. The numbers "418-6" stamped on one key led them to 418 Themis St., Apt. 6 -- later determined to be the apartment of Evans' mother, where he was staying.

Upon searching the residence, police found a pair of tennis shoes with Ervin's blood on them, Swingle said.

Shaminie Athinarayanan, a criminalist with the Missouri State Highway Patrol, testified about working in the crime lab and testing the blood on the tennis shoes. The blood, she said, matched a DNA sample taken from Ervin during his autopsy.

Stephen Callanan, a former Southeast Missouri State University student and one of two witnesses to testify Wednesday, said he saw two black men flee the scene shortly after the shooting. Callanan, who now lives in Springfield, Mo., was intoxicated at the skate park near the crime scene when the shooting occurred. When he saw Ervin's car and heard the gunshots, he thought one of his friends was the victim. When he approached Ervin, he realized it was not his friend and retreated back to the park to call 911.

When Moore asked how intoxicated he was, Callanan said he "had drank too much to drive but was still coherent."

The prosecution, which has 17 people on its witness list, will continue Thursday morning. Evans is undecided as to whether he will testify, Moore said.

Evans declined to comment.

psullivan@semissourian.com

388-3635

Pertinent address:

North Fountain Street and Park Drive, Cape Girardeau, MO