Date: 10-31-2024

Case Style:

State of Arkansas v. Jeffery McPherson

Case Number: 46CR-22-49

Judge: Brent Haltom

Court: Circuit Court, Miller County, Arkansas

Plaintiff's Attorney: Miller County, Arkansas District Attorney's Office

Defendant's Attorney:

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Description:

Texarkana, Arkansas criminal defense lawyer represented the Defendant charged with first-degree murder and tampering with physical evidence.

McPherson was charged as a habitual offender with first-degree murder of his fiancee's two-month-old son, Minor Child ("MC"). The tampering charge, a violation of Arkansas Code Annotated section 5-53-111, arose from allegations that McPherson deleted images captured by an internal surveillance camera that was operating inside McPherson's residence.

The victim, who died on May 25, 2022, was the two-month-old son of Britney Hollowell, McPherson's live-in girlfriend. McPherson is not the child's biological father. In addition to Hollowell, McPherson shared his residence with his four-year-old daughter and Jason Uncel. On April 13, 2022, Hollowell left MC in McPherson's care so she could report to her probation officer. However, she never returned to care for MC because she was arrested for a probation violation and remained incarcerated until after MC's death. In the interim, McPherson was MC's primary caregiver.

MC suffered from intestinal maladies. McPherson told the lead investigator, Detective Douglas Pearson, that he was often sleep deprived and stressed because MC seemed to constantly be in pain, which caused him to cry an "ungodly amount." McPherson stated that he alleviated MC's intestinal issues by moving the child's legs in a circular motion, as if he was riding a bicycle.

In his trial testimony, Jason Uncel confirmed that MC had intestinal issues. He both observed and personally used the bicycle technique to address the child's discomfort. He also noted that the child's crying made McPherson "a little sad" and "kind of crazy." Uncel further stated that McPherson was MC's primary caregiver although he sometimes helped out with MC. According to Uncel, neither he nor McPherson had jobs, and he was currently incarcerated in a residential treatment center, having had his parole revoked due to methamphetamine charges filed against him.

Around ten o'clock on the evening before MC's death, Hollowell called McPherson from the detention center and could hear MC crying in the background. The intensity of his cry that night alarmed her. MC was clearly in pain and crying so hard that he was grasping for breath. Before the call was disconnected, Hollowell begged McPherson to take MC to the hospital.

McPherson told police that on the day of MC's death, he attempted to alleviate the child's pain by helping him to evacuate his bowels. McPherson stated that he picked up the child and patted the baby's buttocks. He then laid MC on the living room sofa and performed the bicycle procedure until the child either defecated or passed gas and stopped crying. McPherson claimed that he was experiencing his own intestinal issues and spent approximately the next thirty minutes in the bathroom. When he returned to check on the child, MC had stopped breathing.

Forensic medical examination of MC revealed that the child suffered from seven healing and fourteen "acute" fractured ribs inflicted near the time of death. MC also had a fresh fracture on his left femur in the metaphyseal region of his left leg. Chief Medical Examiner Dr. Theodore Brown testified that the forensic pathology literature correlated this type of fracture to trauma inflicted on infants. He clarified that the injury was the type that resulted from "dramatic action that was not accidental." The medical literature further noted that it is typically caused by "a pulling or a twisting or even a shaking." In sum, Dr. Brown opined that the healing rib fractures were sustained days to weeks before MC's demise. He stated that the cause of death for MC was blunt-force trauma to the child's chest, which interfered with MC's ability to breathe.

McPherson's home had an internal Ring security camera. According to McPherson, it could be controlled with applications on the mobile phones owned by Hollowell, himself, and Uncel, as well as a tablet that was at the residence. During his interview with police, detectives discovered that the phone that McPherson had been using had been wiped clean and reset to factory settings. Nonetheless, McPherson was able to access the systems video recordings by logging onto a computer with a user name and password. McPherson scrolled through numerous short video clips to a recording that showed him scooping MC's lifeless body from a living room sofa grabbing his car keys and dashing out the door to take the child to the hospital. At the request of the detectives, McPherson surrendered the phone and signed a waiver authorizing police to search the device. According to Detective Pearson, the process of downloading video from the Ring cloud was proving to be difficult and timeconsuming so he turned his attention to completing the interview with McPherson followed by conducting an interview with Uncel. After McPherson left, Detective Pearson returned to the task of downloading the video. However, he discovered that it had been erased. In a recorded phone call from Hollowell, who was incarcerated at the bi-state detention center, McPherson admitted that he had deleted the surveillance video because there was "[stuff] on there that [the police] didn't need to see."...

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McPherson v. State, 2024 Ark. 163, CR-24-45 (Ark. Oct 31, 2024)

Outcome: Defendant was found guilty.

Affirmed on appeal.

Plaintiff's Experts:

Defendant's Experts:

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