11:23 a.m. Wednesday update A Washington County Circuit Court jury returned sentencing verdicts Wednesday morning in the case of a Fayetteville man accused of trying to kill a confidential police informant, including a recommended 30 years for attempted capital murder, but formal sentencing was postponed.
Lasaba Hill, 42, is expected to be sentenced at 11 a.m. Thursday.
Earlier
FAYETTEVILLE -- A Washington County jury Tuesday night found a Fayetteville man accused of trying to kill a confidential police informant last summer guilty of attempted capital murder but found he didn't batter the man and was not a felon in possession of a gun at the time.
Lasaba Hill, 42, was also found guilty of intimidating an informant, stalking and delivery of methamphetamine by the Washington County Circuit Court jury.
Hill faces from 10 years to life in prison. He has at least five prior felonies for drug crimes, theft and a sex offense dating to 1995, making him a habitual offender which automatically brings longer prison terms.
The jury will return at 9 a.m. today to deliberate sentences.
The jury deliberated about five hours before Circuit Judge William Storey checked their progress. Storey sent the jury back out to see if they could reach a decision before deciding whether to send them home for the evening. An hour later they returned with verdicts. Storey polled the jury on their attempted capital murder conviction and each jurors confirmed that was their verdict.
Jurors began deliberating sentences about 9 p.m. but came back minutes later and said they wanted to go home for the night.
Prosecutors said they filed the attempted capital murder charge because Hill's premeditated and deliberate purpose was to kill the confidential informant and he took substantial steps to do so.
Denis Dean, deputy prosecutor, told jurors the informant was threatened, beaten and almost killed over the selling of one-third gram of methamphetamine.
"This is teaching somebody a lesson, you don't mess with Lasaba Hill," Dean told jurors in his closing argument.
The defense maintained Hill wanted to scare the informant, and perhaps beat him for being a snitch, but didn't intend to kill the man.
"If your intent was to kill someone and you have them on the ground, why hit him (with the gun)," Blake Chancellor said in his closing argument."If he wanted to kill him at that point it would have been very easy to do."
Prosecutors said the confidential informant bought what was supposed to be a gram of methamphetamine from Hill in October 2013. The meth weighed one-half gram and had been cut with something else. The two men lived in the same apartment complex on West Holly Street, near Oak Plaza and Harps.
Hill was arrested in April for intent to deliver meth. In June, Hill learned the confidential informant's identity from documents being prepared for his case. Hill started going to the informant's apartment, harassing and threatening to kill him, according to testimony.
On July 28, the situation came to a head when the informant says Hill attacked him on the balcony at the apartment complex. He said Hill grabbed him and threw him down before telling his wife to bring a gun. The informant said Hill's wife brought a backpack and Hill retrieved a semi-automatic handgun from it and hit the informant in the head with the gun.
The informant broke free, jumped over the rail and ran toward Oak Plaza with Hill in pursuit, trying to clear the gun that had malfunctioned. The informant lost his shirt, hat and a shoe during the tussle.
Police found a bullet near a gap in the fence where the informant told them Hill had been trying to clear the weapon, according to testimony. The gun was never found and prosecutors said they believe a family member got rid of it.
Police found and arrested Hill at the nearby Harps store on Garland Avenue. About five officers searched the grocery store and several nearby businesses as well as the tops of several buildings but no gun was found.
A neighbor testified Monday she called police because she heard fighting outside her apartment. She said a man was yelling he was going to kill another man. She said she saw through a window Hill holding the informant by his shirt and he was dangling over the balcony rail. The last time she saw the two, Hill was chasing the informant.
NW News on 12/17/2014