Testifying at his own trial for murder Tuesday, Lamont Motes gave jurors a moment-by-moment explanation of where he was as two men were beaten to death by a mob after a van crash last year, telling the panel he hurried to the scene to find his daughter.
Motes said he was headed to go play basketball when he left his 1-year-old daughter with his cousin Jenny Lawrence, who was among the women injured when the van slammed into a stoop at 40th Street and Lake Park Avenue. He said he was a block away talking to a friend when his younger sister ran up to him and told him that Jenny and the other women on the porch had been hit.
“When I got there, I saw a massive crowd running everywhere,” said Motes, a lanky 20-year-old who faces a possible life sentence if convicted. “It was just chaos.”
“I was concerned that this was the exact area my daughter was in,” he said. “Where was my daughter?”
Motes said he found her safe, with a relative across the street.
During cross-examination, Assistant State’s Atty. Mercedes Luque-Rosales hammered away at every detail of Motes’ account, from how fast he said he jogged to the scene, to what he saw of the attack.
Motes testified that from 2 feet away, he stared at the bodies of Jack Moore and Anthony Stuckey because he was curious. Motes said he looked over Moore’s body first.
“Did you kick him at that time, Mr. Motes?” the prosecutor asked in a loud voice, stepping toward the witness stand.
“No, I didn’t,” Motes answered in a steady voice.
Luque-Rosales also challenged Motes’ version of who he said he saw punching and kicking the victims. Asked if he recognized anyone who might have been in the area fighting, Motes named two men who have not been charged, and Antonio Fort, the youngest of the eight defendants charged in the case. But Motes said he could not see what Fort was doing.
Under questioning from Luque-Rosales, Motes said he did not see his two uncles, Henry and Roosevelt Lawrence, do anything. Both men have been charged with murder in the case, and the jury in Motes’ case has heard incriminating evidence against them.
Motes said he later went to his home in the 5000 block of South Evans Avenue, going to sleep in the early morning of July 31, the day after the beatings.
He testified that his brother woke him up after getting a phone call, suggesting that a relative at the murder scene had called to warn him that the police were looking for him. When they arrived, Motes admitted to the jury that he fled the home on foot.
“I told them (detectives) I ran because I was nervous–I was scared,” he told the jury. “I told them I wasn’t in my right mind.”
Motes then testified he spent more than four days in a holding cell at Wentworth Area police headquarters.
“It was freezing,” he said. “It was a small box (of a room) with a steel bench that I was handcuffed to.”
Last week, Eddie Lonnel Harkins, who was in the police lockup with Motes, testified against him. Harkins had told the jury Motes told him authorities had no evidence on him, such as blood on his shoes, because he had burned them.
Under questioning from his attorney, Frank Himel, Motes first said he never spoke a word to Harkins.
But under cross-examination Tuesday, he said the two spoke mostly about Harkins’ case.
However, Motes testified that he did not burn his shoes.
Prosecutors ended their questioning of Motes by asking if he wanted the men who had hurt the women held responsible.
Motes responded that he was sad and wanted justice to take its rightful course.
Luque-Rosales countered that that’s the way it should have been.
“That’s the way it should’ve been,” Motes agreed.
