National Roundup

North Carolina
Settlement reached in lawsuit over fatal campus shooting
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. (AP) — A settlement has been reached in a lawsuit stemming from a fatal shooting on the Wake Forest University campus nearly two years ago, according to court documents.

Documents filed in U.S. District Court show a settlement between the school’s chapter of Delta Sigma Theta, a defendant in the lawsuit, and the mother of shooting victim Najee Baker, who filed a wrongful-death lawsuit on behalf of her son’s estate, the Winston-Salem Journal reported on Tuesday.

Claims against other defendants in the lawsuit, including Wake Forest, are still pending, the newspaper reported.

Baker, a football player at Winston-Salem State University, was attending a party at a venue on the Wake Forest campus on Jan. 20, 2018, when he was shot. Baker died about an hour later from a gunshot wound to the abdomen. Two people are charged in Baker’s death, including Jakier Shanique Austin, 23, who was charged with murder, possession of a firearm on educational property and carrying a concealed weapon.

Delta Sigma Theta hosted the party. The lawsuit alleges that the sorority was negligent in allowing Austin and Smith, who did not attend any colleges in the area, to attend the event. According to police and the lawsuit, Baker fought with Austin and the second person inside the venue.

Investigators said that after the fight was broken up and the party ended, Austin and the second person went to their car and got guns before confronting Baker and another Winston-Salem State student on a campus road. Austin shot Baker while the second person held the second WSSU student at gunpoint, the lawsuit said.

New York
Man exonerated of murdering his parents will become lawyer
GARDEN CITY, N.Y. (AP) — A New York man who spent 17 years in prison for the murders of his parents before his conviction was thrown out is expected to be sworn in as a lawyer on Wednesday.

Martin Tankleff is scheduled to be admitted to the New York State bar, making him one of a small number of exonerees practicing law in the state, Newsday reported.

Barry Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project, said Tankleff passed the bar exam in 2017 but faced a long approval process for admittance to the bar. Tankleff graduated from Touro Law Center in Central Islip in 2014. He has taught at both Touro and Georgetown University and worked as a paralegal at a law firm in Manhattan.

Tankleff said he plans to practice criminal and civil rights law and help defendants with wrongful convictions.

“Part of me wants to help educate the legal system to the pitfalls, to prevent wrongful convictions -- what things to be wary of and what to look for,” he said.

Tankleff’s parents were bludgeoned and stabbed in their waterfront home in 1988 in Belle Terre, on Long Island. Police said he confessed to the crime after a detective falsely told him his father had awakened from a coma and implicated him. Tankleff, who was 17 at the time of his parents’ deaths, quickly recanted and refused to sign a written statement police had prepared.

An appellate court overturned his conviction in 2007. He was awarded a $10 million settlement in 2018 following a federal court lawsuit against Suffolk County.

Kansas
Woman on trial in decapitation of mother of ex-boyfriend
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — A Kansas woman is on trial for murder in the decapitation of her ex-boyfriend’s mother whose body was discovered in the suspect’s garage and her head was dumped in the kitchen sink.

Rachael Hilyard, of Wichita, is charged with first-degree murder in the April 2017 killing of 63-year-old Micki Davis. Prosecutors say Hilyard demanded that Davis collect her son’s belongings from her home. Davis and her 9-year-old grandson went to Hilyard’s home, and that’s when Hilyard attacked.

Authorities say the boy ran away and called the police using his grandmother’s cellphone. He wasn’t present when his grandmother was killed.

As the trial got underway Tuesday, defense attorney Quentin Pittman didn’t dispute that his client killed Davis and said he anticipated the jury would find her guilty of the “appropriate charge.” He didn’t say what that charge might be, The Wichita Eagle  reported.

Prosecutors said they would introduce evidence at trial such as testimony from the police officers who discovered Davis’ body lying in Hilyard’s garage, a taped law enforcement interview with the grandson, and photos of the crime scene.

In a jail house interview not long after she was arrested, Hilyard told The Eagle that God was responsible for Davis’ death. She said a church had performed an exorcism to eradicate “evil spirits” at her house in the days before the killing. She has received treatment at the state psychiatric hospital since her arrest.

She was declared competent for trial  in August.

Her trial is expected to last through the week. She remains in custody at the Sedgwick County Jail in lieu of bonds totaling $550,000.


New Jersey
Woman accused of fatal nail-clipper stabbing to stay jailed
MILLVILLE, N.J. (AP) — A woman accused of using a nail clipper to fatally stab her husband will remain jailed until her murder trial, a judge has ruled.

Kathleen Ayala, 30, also faces weapons charges stemming from the Jan. 12 attack at a mobile home complex in Millville.

Ayala and Axel Torres, 35, were arguing in their trailer when the dispute turned physical, according to the Cumberland County Prosecutor’s Office. Torres left the trailer, but prosecutors said Ayala chased after him, repeatedly stabbing him. Torres lost consciousness and was taken to a hospital but died there the next day.

Ayala told police she was responsible for the attack but only wanted to scare her husband and did not intend to physically harm him, authorities have said. She stabbed him with a metal file from the clippers.

Torres suffered wounds to his feet, hands, shoulders and left leg.

Ayala initially was charged with assault, but prosecutors upgraded the charge to murder following Torres’ death. She faces a potential life sentence if convicted.

Torres allegedly headbutted Ayala minutes before the stabbing occurred, causing her to suffer a concussion and a broken nose. Her attorney, Eugene Tinari, argued during the detention hearing late last month that Ayala’s injuries and her likely compromised mental state, from the headbutt, undercut the validity of filing murder charges against her.