A jury deadlocked 6-6 Dec. 29 for second-degree murder in a 3-week trial in Chula Vista Superior Court after losing three jurors and even the defense attorney due to illness.
The jury deliberated about five hours over two days in the case of Rodney Eric Martin, 30, who is charged with killing Raymond Lipscomb, 27, in the E-Z 8 Motel at 1010 Outer Road in the Palm City area.
Jurors did acquit Martin of first-degree murder and found the allegation of personal use of a firearm to be not true. Martin will have a second trial which was set for Feb. 20.
Judge Stephanie Sontag replaced three jurors with alternate jurors towards the end of the trial after they became too ill to participate. Jurors were instructed on Dec. 20, but one juror threw up in a bathroom during a break. He was too ill to continue. The trial was in recess for several days so jurors could recover as there was only one alternate juror left.
Then Martin’s attorney, Paul Pfingst, came down the flu and he couldn’t give his closing argument until Dec. 28. They deliberated Dec. 28 and 29. The 6-6 split for second-degree murder is an even split, and jurors told Sontag that further discussions would not result in a verdict.
Deputy District Attorney Matthew Greco argued Martin was the gunman. Lipscomb was shot in the torso and transported to a hospital where he died.
A co-defendant, Maurice Leon Hayes, 22, pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter in November and faces up to 12 years in prison when he is sentenced on Feb. 9. A murder charge against him was dismissed.
Pfingst said his client “wasn’t even there” at the motel and someone else shot Lipscomb.
He said some of the witnesses against Martin were not truthful.
Pfingst said the armed allegation carried a 25-year prison term, so Martin won’t face that charge because the jury found it not to be true. “There’s still a lot of work to be done,” said Pfingst regarding the retrial.
On Jan. 1, Martin’s mother, Esther Torbert, told a reporter “the evidence was not there” to convict her son. “Rodney Martin was not there at all,” she said.
A former co-defendant, Taron Dunn, 29, testified in the trial under a grant of immunity.
Dunn had been charged as an accessory after the fact, and that charge was dismissed against him. Martin was acquainted with Lipscomb.
San Diego Police arrested Martin on June 29, 2016, and Hayes on July 5, 2016. They both remain in jail.
