A nearly nine-year-old murder and home invasion case was dismissed on Jan. 11 after the main witness recanted her testimony.
Xavier Jones, 32, was charged in April 2015 with killing Juble Hairston, then 36, Jones’ ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend.
Deputy Prosecutor Lindsay Lanham wrote on Jan. 10 that the woman “recanted” and claimed Jones wasn’t the shooter. Without her testimony, they weren’t able to prove the case.
It was dismissed without prejudice, meaning it could be filed again.
Jones’ defense attorney Scott King said Wednesday the dismissal had been expected “for some time,” even before her latest deposition last fall. There, she again took back what she told police years earlier.
The testimony was “pretty much their case,” he said. The homicide was a “tragedy,” but he was “happy for my client we were able to get this resolved.”
When police first spoke to Hairston’s girlfriend, she told them she would recognize the assailant but provided no name. She told Sgt. Dan Callahan she and Hairston were in her bedroom at her Woodlake Village apartment before dawn on April 4, 2015 when she heard loud noises at the door and confronted a man who had kicked in the door, the probable cause affidavit states.
Hairston’s girlfriend saw the man had a gun and she pushed him, and he pushed her back, the affidavit states. She ran to her mother’s home nearby. When Cpl. Jeff Hornyak arrived at the apartment, Hairston was dead on the floor. His girlfriend told police she would recognize the man, but at first did not provide detectives with the name of the suspect she encountered, documents said.
After obtaining additional information from other sources, Callahan questioned her again about a week after the homicide and she identified the assailant as Jones, the affidavit states. She chose his photograph in a lineup and told Callahan she and Jones “had previously dated,” the court record states. She told Callahan she was in shock when the shooting occurred. Her mother said she knew Jones and “considered him a family friend,” the affidavit states. She also said her daughter said that night that Jones killed Hairston.
“She indicated the delay in communicating the identification information was because she was in fear for her daughter’s life,” the affidavit states.
mcolias@post-trib.com
Former Post-Tribune reporter Lori Caldwell contributed.
