RICHMOND, Va. -- The trial began Tuesday for Jesus Turner, the third and final suspect in the 2019 Memorial Day fatal shooting of nine-year-old Markiya Dickson.
The shooting at Carter Jones Park in Richmond also injured two other people.
In their opening statement, prosecutors alleged three men arrived at the park around 7:30 p.m. and got into a shootout with another man with whom Turner had longstanding issues.
They alleged gunshots fired by Turner and the other two men went in the direction of a large crowd in the park for a Memorial Day cookout.
The bullets killed Dickson and injured two other people, including an 11-year-old boy.
Turner's defense attorney told the jury that while some aspects of the case were not in dispute, he told them to question the reliability of the prosecution's witnesses.
He said to listen to what they said in the trials for the two other men charged in the shooting and what they'll say now.
He added that during the investigation leading up to the trial, no one actually put Turner at the park when the shooting happened.
Two other men, Quinshawn Betts and Jermaine Davis, have already been tried in this case.
Both also faced first-degree murder charges but were convicted of second-degree murder.
Among the first witnesses was one man, who the trio was accused of shooting in the direction of. That witness was uncooperative on the stand and refused to answer many questions. He told the court he was done with this and did not want to be there. At one point, the judge warned the witness he could be held in contempt. Prosecutors had to refer back to the witness's previous testimony in order to get his story out to the jury.
Turner's trial is scheduled for two days.
