Witnesses, surveillance and autopsies presented as Jefferson County murder trial moves to jury

BEAUMONT, Texas — Jurors in the 252nd District Court heard testimony, saw surveillance and autopsy evidence and received the court's instructions after several witnesses described events surrounding shootings at 1830 LG Street.

Prosecutors called Dijon Ivory, who had pleaded guilty in a related matter and was brought to testify. Ivory at times declined to answer on the stand; the judge warned him that giving false testimony could lead to an aggravated-perjury prosecution and told him, "If you lie today, you can go to prison." The court also advised that prolonged silence on yes-or-no questions could be treated as a denial for impeachment purposes.

The state also called Shirley Jackson, who testified she drove a white Ford Expedition the night of the incident and that she dropped three men off near the dead-end street. Jackson told jurors she later retrieved her phone, returned to the area and identified two men who later got back into her vehicle. On cross-examination she said PJ (Paul Westbrooks Jr.) grabbed a handgun from her console when he left the car, and she later disposed of two handguns and magazines in dumpsters; investigators later recovered weapons wrapped in a towel from a landfill and photographs of the recovery were admitted into evidence.

Detective Saev (Saeve) Saron testified that investigators recovered multiple surveillance recordings showing vehicles arriving and leaving the dead-end street, that they identified Jackson's Expedition at her workplace and subsequently seized and searched it, and that other surveillance corroborated parts of Jackson's account. The detective said the investigation showed three people went to the house that night and that the surveillance and witness accounts were used to identify suspects.

Forensic testimony linked the medical evidence to the shootings. Dr. Feng Li, a forensic pathologist, testified about autopsies performed on the two men who died. Dr. Li said one victim sustained a perforating gunshot wound to the trunk with an exit wound and heavy internal bleeding and that "the cause of death is gunshot wound of the trunk" and the manner of death was ruled homicide. The other victim's abdominal entrance wound showed stippling consistent with a relative close range, the doctor testified.

Hunter Jones, a firearms examiner with the Jefferson County crime lab, testified that two recovered firearms functioned normally; Jones said the fired projectile recovered from the scene was too damaged to be positively matched to either weapon, but he reported that a fired cartridge case (9 mm) could be associated with one of the seized pistols.

Prosecutors introduced multiple exhibits that the judge admitted into evidence: surveillance video compiled as State's Exhibit 10, photos of the landfill recovery (States 11'17), the two seized firearms (States 18 and 19) and autopsy reports (States 38 and 39). The court also admitted an interview video of Ivory (State's Exhibit 37) for impeachment purposes after objections were overruled for that limited use.

Defense counsel pressed witnesses on inconsistencies. During Ivory's testimony, the defense argued the witness gave differing accounts about who entered the house and who fired shots. The judge sustained some objections and overruled others as the parties disputed hearsay and impeachment uses of prior statements.

After witnesses finished, the judge read the court's charge on capital murder and murder to the jury, including instructions on accomplice testimony and party liability. The court told jurors the defendant could be convicted either as the primary actor or as a party who solicited, encouraged, directed or aided another person in committing the offenses. The jury went to deliberate with copies of the charge and verdict forms for capital murder and murder; no verdict was announced in court that day.