San Angelo Man Sentenced to 20 Years For Aggravated Assault

SAN ANGELO, TX – After four long hours of deliberation Thursday night, a jury returned with a verdict of guilty in the case against Levi Todd Turner. The 26-year-old was back in court Friday as the jury heard testimony that would help them decide his punishment. Aggravated assault with a deadly weapon charge carries anywhere from 2 to 20 years in prison.

Not only was Turner found guilty, but the jury expounded the maximum sentence.

Thursday morning began with the victim, Desiree Reyes, taking the stand. Reyes faced serious questioning on behalf of Defense Attorney John Sutton. He questioned the victim in her retelling of the events of that night in January of 2015, especially regarding the contradictions he observed between her testimony and the statement given to the police at the time of the incident.

Sutton was referring to the initial description of the suspect, which was only “a white male.” Mrs. Reyes had stated previously in court that she had given a more detailed description to other detectives, outside of the presence of the jury, but both of them recalled only using the license plate number, description of the vehicle and the basic white male description. For the previous details of Turner’s trial, please click here and here.

Reyes explained that she had the opportunity to see the suspect's face several times during the altercation, for he had his passenger window all the way down and was constantly matching her speed while he yelled at her through his passenger window. She saw him once again after the incident had occurred, when they spotted him at the Stripes gas station pumps at the intersection of Sherwood Way and Garfield as he waited for the light to turn green. This was in accordance with the second 911 call placed that evening by the victim, in which she told 911 that she had seen her assailant once again. According to Reyes's testimony, Turner appeared to be “taunting” them when they saw him on the street.

Sutton also questioned the fact that, in her testimony, Reyes stated when she slammed on her brakes, after her husband pushed her chest back with his arm, she had seen the barrel of the gun, which appeared be red as if it had just been fired. Defense council also questioned whether the other driver would have been able to anticipate her slamming her brakes and do the same. Reyes noted that during the time the cars had been slowing down considerably, she did think it was possible for the other driver to stop within moments of her doing it. After this, she stated the car pulled in front of her and turned right on Jackson Street off Avenue N. At that point, she and her husband were able to see the license plate clearly and pass that information on to the 911 operator. After answering the defense council’s questions, Reyes was excused and the State rested. She was visibly upset when she left the courtroom.

The Defense then called two witnesses to the stand: Levi Turner and his brother Austin Turner. According to the Defendant, it had been his decision to take the stand and Sutton began questioning his actions and activity regarding the day in question. Turner said that after running errands around town during the morning, he had gone home to take a nap. After waking up at approximately 6 or 7 p.m., he received a call from Jordan Page, the witness who testified previously. After that conversation, he made his way to Popeyes for dinner. From there, he proceeded to make his way down Avenue N around the same time of the assault. He placed himself in the vicinity at the general time of the incident, but denied ever seeing the Reyes family or shooting at them. He also stated he had never seen the victims prior to them identifying him as the suspect.

As he moved on with his version of events, Turner told the court he had been on Avenue N because he was on his way to purchase marijuana from his dealer who lived in the College Hills area. When Sutton questioned why he never told this to the police, Turner said since the detective had told him he was “facing life,” he didn’t want to make matters worse. In regards to the witnesses’ previous testimony where they said a black man was traveling with the Defendant, Turner stated he was alone and that he “doesn’t hang out with people in general,” unless they are “lady friends.” Additionally, Turner admitted to picking up an ounce of marijuana from his dealer, Breezy, and proceeded to go back to his apartment, at the Bella Vista Apartments, by going down Knickerbocker Rd. He maintained he was never on Sherwood Way that night. As to road rage being the motive to the suspect pulling a gun on the Reyes family, Turner alleged that he had never been involved in an incident of that type, and, in fact, he “drives rather slow.”

Turner also recalled going vermin hunting at the EQ the day before and that could explain the one particle of GSR that had been found on his face the day of the assault. He stated, since he had moved out of his ex-girlfriend’s home, he had had a limited amount of clothes. He had worn the same shirt as the day before because he considered it to be “clean.”

Moving on to the gun, Turner stated he had bought it six months prior to the day of the assault from an acquaintance of an acquaintance who had offered the gun for sale.

“I happened to meet a guy and that guy had a gun for sale,” Turner said.

When asked by ADA Knight why he had not told the officers he had a gun, Turner responded that he was “exercising his right,” to which she countered and asked if he was referring to “exercising his right by lying.” Turner explained that he had been subject to previous police searches that had resulted in his car being “cut up” by officers. Knight then proceeded to ask Turner if he considered aggravated assault a serious offense, to which he replied that it was “relatively serious” and it depended if the injuries were “serious.”

The last witness to take the stand was the defendant’s brother, Austin Turner. Turner provided the court with pictures taken of his brother’s car at approximately the same time as the day of the incident. This was an attempt from the Defense to represent the visibility that the victims might have had during the incident. Knight asked if the pictures were taken at the same location of the assault, to which he responded they were not. After this, he was excused and the Defense rested. Judge Weatherby then excused the jury for lunch and advised them to return by 2:30 p.m. to hear closing arguments.

As Mr. Sutton began his final arguments, he reminded the jury that, “if you aren’t sure enough, [and] you have reasonable doubt,” they should return a verdict of not guilty. He argued that certain “pieces of the puzzle aren’t there.” The single particle of GSR on his face could have been transferred. He also pointed out that the clothes and samples were not tested after one particle was positively identified and that, during the 911 call, the victim is heard exclaiming “everything happened so fast; I couldn’t see his face.”  Sutton also questioned the ID of the license plate, arguing that since everything had happened “so fast,” maybe in the hysteria of it all, the family had identified the wrong car and license plate.

“I’m not saying this is a frame up. This happened to her; there is no doubt,” Sutton said.

Sutton noted that even though the Defendant had been in the area at the same time as the witness, there was a chance they had misidentified him.

During her arguments, Knight went on to describe the assault as a “random act of deadly violence.”

She asked the jury to no let themselves be “distracted” by the minor details that could have been mistaken initially after the trauma, but to look at the facts. The police had found a loaded gun; they found GSR; they matched the vehicle description and the license plate; and the Defendant has been positively identified by two individuals during separate show up IDs.

Once the argument concluded, the jury moved into the jury room to begin their deliberation a couple of minutes after 4 p.m. They stayed in deliberation for nearly four hours until returning with a verdict of guilty a little after 8 p.m.

Friday morning, the jury reconvened for one last time at 10:30 a.m. to hear testimony and evidence before deliberating on the sentence Turner would face after committing aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Before the jury was brought in, the Defendant and his lawyer, Mr. Sutton, asked that a signed stipulation be accepted by the court in which Turner pleaded guilty to the subsequent charges of possession of marijuana and cocaine. Turner had testified that he had been on the way to purchase marijuana during his testimony and the evidence had been found during the search of his vehicle. Detectives and SAPD officers had found several bags of marijuana, a bag of narcotics that was identified as cocaine and a scale. To this offense, Turner pleaded guilty because he had violated the deferred adjudication of a previous drug charge in 2013. As a result, Turner was sentenced to four years at the institutional division of the TDCJ. This sentencing was done outside of the presence of the jury as they deliberated the aggravated assault charge.

Next, the State  presented various witnesses, including the victim, who spoke of the impact this incident has caused her and her family. She stated that her kids had been scared to sleep by themselves for three months.

Additionally, one of Turner’s ex-girlfriends, Latasha Branch, testified that there had been an occasion where she had called SAPD to have Turner removed from her house. She stated that she harbored no anger towards the Defendant. In fact, she said she “loved him.” During the physical altercation, she had hit the Defendant and he hit her back, causing a gash on her face. She said never pressed charges and just wanted him to leave.

Two correctional officers also testified. Officer Tellez spoke about a verbal altercation in which he felt the Defendant had threatened him by saying, “If only you weren’t a cop;” however, there was never a physical altercation between them. Officer Pruitt testified that he had broken up a fight between Turner and another inmate, but that Turner had never been physical with another guard and he is currently "a trustee status" at the jail.

SAPD Officer Fincher and Detectives Chavarria and Dye also testified to the drugs they had found in Turner’s car and their experience in road rage cases respectively. The officer who responded to the assault at Latasha Brown’s  house also testified to responding to the call and what he encountered at the scene, during which time the Defendant was not present.

The last person to take the stand once again was Austin Turner who spoke about his brother’s upbringing and the person he had become after being involved with drugs. He stated that, in the two years that Turner had been incarcerated, he had become the “Levi from before” and he had seen progress in the way that Turner looked at life.

After returning from lunch at 2:30 p.m., both attorneys presented their final summations. Sutton stood before the jury and asked them to sentence the Levi Turner of today, not the Levi of two years ago. Since his time of incarceration, he has been clean and has worked to become a better person, and all he asked of the jury was that they consider the effects of incarcerating Turner for a long time. He asked that they give him the opportunity to have something to look forward to in the future, and, in the end, allow him to be a positive addition to the community instead of causing "him to lose hope.”

ADA Knight presented the jury one more time with the pictures of the assault and reminded them that Levi had had another chance. He had been given deferred adjudication and he had clearly violated it. Plus, he had a violent history. She asked them to consider the “safety of our community and be thankful that he didn’t use the other 99 [bullets].”

The jury then retired to the jury room at 3:15 p.m., and for nearly two hours they deliberated the sentence deemed appropriate for the offense. The charge for which Turner was found guilty could carry a punishment from anywhere between 2 to 20 years. As the jury came back, they deemed that 20 years was the appropriate sentencing for the crime.

After Judge Weatherby thanked the jury for their time and dismissed them from the case, the victim looked at Turner and told him, “I forgive you and my family forgives you. I hope this experience changes you.”

Turner will also serve the four years for the possession charge concurrently with the sentence of the aggravated assault charge and will be given time credits for the time he spent in jail previously, a little over two years.

Mr. Sutton also expressed to the court that Turner would most likely be appealing the decision, and, if that was the case, he would be withdrawing as council to "allow a fresh pair of eyes to look at the case."