FORT SMITH -- Gregory Aaron Kinsey's defense in the slaying of two men with a machete last year will be self-defense one of his attorneys told a Sebastian County circuit judge Thursday.
Arkansas Public Defender Commission attorney Katherine Streett made the statement to Circuit Judge Stephen Tabor during a hearing over a questionnaire that prospective jurors in Kinsey's coming capital murder trial would be asked to complete.
Tabor said the questionnaire would be used to weed out obviously unsuitable jurors and speed up the jury selection process.
Kinsey, 21, is charged with two counts of capital murder in the June 26, 2013, slayings of Nathan Young, 32, and Brandon Price, 39, during a confrontation on a north Fort Smith street. Prosecuting attorney Dan Shue said in August 2013 that he will seek the death penalty against Kinsey.
Streett revealed Kinsey would pursue a self-defense argument as she, Shue and Tabor discussed a notice to potential jurors on the questionnaire about how long the trial would take. Jury selection is scheduled for Nov. 13 and 14 with testimony beginning Nov. 17. The trial is expected to last a week or more.
Streett told Tabor she expected the presentation of the defense's case to take a day with half a day taken up with the testimony of an eyewitness.
Police reports on the case stated that Nathan Maynard was standing on a porch with Young and Price before they were killed, and he witnessed the attack.
Kinsey was present for the hour-long hearing Thursday, sitting quietly throughout, not speaking with his three female attorneys. He wore a white T-shirt under the orange jail uniform, and his arms were shackled to his side by a chain that ran around his waist.
His appearance had changed little from his initial arrest more than a year ago. His long, dark brown hair reached past his shoulders, accenting his pale complexion, but a 5-inch-long goatee appeared longer than at the time of his arrest.
According to a Fort Smith police report by Detective Jeff Carter on Kinsey's explanation of the attack, he was walking down an alley about 9:30 p.m. June 26, 2013, after buying some groceries. He said he stopped to look through a space in a fence at one house because he thought he saw a person who once dated his mother and was violent toward her.
Young, standing on a porch in the 1600 block of North D Street with Price and Maynard, saw Kinsey looking through the fence at his home and yelled at him. Maynard said it appeared Kinsey was "up to no good," according to the report.
As he walked out of the alley into the street, Kinsey told Carter that he tried to explain he thought he saw a man he knew, but Young and Price walked into the street, blocked Kinsey's path and asked "why he was creeping around in the shadows," the report stated.
Kinsey became angry and threw down his bag of groceries, he told Carter. Maynard told police he heard Kinsey tell the men he was Satan and pull a machete from the back of his pants.
He said Price and Young did not appear frightened by the machete and moved closer to Kinsey.
Kinsey told Carter he did not think the men would let him pass and began slashing and hacking at the men even after they tried to run away. He told Carter he felt detached from his actions, as if he were watching himself in a movie.
He didn't stop swinging the machete until one of the men, on the ground, held up his hands and said he gave up.
Kinsey told Carter he did not attack to kill the men but to wound them. If he wanted to kill them, he would not have left them breathing.
"Mr. Kinsey said he could claim self defense but, ultimately, he swung first," Carter's report said.
Kinsey told Carter that while sitting in the police station waiting to be questioned, it occurred to him that he could have left when the two men ran away from him.
Both men died at the scene from wounds suffered in the attack, according to the reports.
Metro on 08/12/2014