The retrial for two men accused of fatally shooting an off-duty corrections officer in 2012 came to an end Wednesday
TRENTON - Maurice Skillman and Hykeem Tucker were there the night shots rang out and flashes of gunfire lit up the darkness outside the Baldassari Regency Banquet Hall in 2012.
They were there the night that off-duty Mercer County Corrections Officer Carl Batie - partway through a conversation on the banquet hall balcony - suddenly dropped to the ground from a single gunshot wound to his forehead.
And they ran from the banquet hall after the shots, similar to many people who flooded the streets in panic.
All of that, Mercer County Prosecutors and defense attorneys can agree on in the case of Skillman and Tucker - two men accused of Batie's murder that night in November, 2012.
Hykeem Tucker (left) and Maurice Skillman (right) are on trial for the 2012 slaying of off-duty corrections officer Carl Batie But that's where their stories diverge dramatically.
For defense attorneys Nicole Carlo and Chris Campbell, the case against Skillman and Tucker holds no water. It has "grainy" surveillance video, an unsecured crime scene and a detective who hastily pointed the finger at Skillman and Tucker, Carlo said Wednesday.
"The family deserves justice but not at the hands of wrongfully accusing my client," Carlo said to the jury, putting a hand on Skillman's shoulder.
For Assistant Prosecutor Jim Scott, however, the evidence is clear. Using surveillance videos and an identification from Tucker himself, police were able track Skillman and Tucker throughout the banquet hall, outside and finally, to the parking lot where the shots originated, he said.
Scott, Carlo and Campbell all addressed jurors Wednesday in their closing statements for the murder retrial. Skillman and Tucker were arrested within months after the 2012 shooting. They went to trial in January but it ended in a hung jury.
During the second trial - which started last week - prosecutors and defense attorneys focused heavily on the question of identification.
Murder retrial examines evidence in street
Scott claimed that after the murder, police got video surveillance of the area inside and around the Baldassari Regency Banquet Hall. They found two suspicious men - who they deemed "tall guy," and "varsity jacket guy," - walking in the hall and outside. The men rummaged through a car that was parked in the lot outside the banquet hall. Then they came to stand in the parking lot just before the shooting. Scott argued in the closing statements that flashes of light in the video of the parking lot were gunfire.
Scott said that lead detective on the case, Scott Peterson, used a still of a surveillance video that showed Tucker wearing a varsity jacket in the banquet hall that night to aid in his investigation.
Peterson followed the man in the varsity jacket and his tall friend - later identified by police as Skillman - throughout the subsequent surveillance videos. By the end, he was convinced that they were the same two men who stood in the parking lot and fired the gun.
But Carlo and Campbell - who represents Tucker - both took issue with video evidence, which Carlo deemed "grainy."
It was a copy of the original surveillance and as a result, police couldn't enhance the video, she argued.
The surveillance video isn't clear enough to identify the two men who stood in the parking lot where the shots originated, Carlo said.
She put out a suggestion anyway.
A man named Shaquel Rock, who was at the bar that night threatened a police officer outside, saying that the officer's "badge won't stop a bullet," Carlo reminded jurors. She suggested that he was more likely to return to the banquet hall that night after the threat.
"Are you fully convinced that who you saw in that video is Maurice Skillman and Hykeem Tucker?" she asked jurors.
The retrial's central question is similar to that of the original January trial - does the video surveillance clearly show or give evidence to Skillman and Tucker's involvement in the murder?
The jury left Wednesday afternoon but will reconvene for deliberations on Thursday and Friday.
Anna Merriman may be reached at amerriman@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @anna_merriman Find The Times of Trenton on Facebook.