By Monica Velez
Liberty Landowski’s testimony resumed on March 17, 2016, with Deputy District Attorney Robin Johnson direct examining the witness in Eric Lovett’s criminal trial. Mr. Lovett is being charged with accessory to attempted murder after the fact, dissuading a witness and gang enhancements.
Ms. Johnson was trying to clarify how Ms. Landowski was associated with the shooting of Ernie Sotelo, the connection being the white Mustang described as the car that pulled up to Mr. Sotelo the day he got shot. Michael Reyes got out of the car, approached Sotelo and shot him multiple times. Mr. Sotelo did not notice the driver.
Ms. Landowski said she knew the police were looking for her car because her friend, and co-defendant in the July 2012 trial, heard it over the police scanner. When asked, Landowski said she assumed the car was hers because they mentioned Mr. Reye’s name, and she was the one who gave him a ride.
Ms. Johnson brought up the procedure Ms. Landowski had to follow after she was released from custody. The gang enhancement she was convicted of made it mandatory for her to register as a gang offender.
Ms. Landowski said she went to the West Sacramento Police Department to register and there she talked to Detective Anthony Herrera in an interview room. The only thing Landowski remembered was Detective Herrera asking her about her involvement in gangs, and she said she did not remember details from the conversation.
Johnson gave Landowski a report Detective Herrera wrote describing what happened during the interview, and still Landowski said she did not remember what the details of the conversation were.
The defense asked to approach the judge during this line of questioning, and then Judge David Maguire asked the jury to step out of the courtroom because counsel had legal matters to discuss.
Johnson argued, outside the presence of the jury, that the court should make a finding that the witness is being purposefully evasive. She requested permission to ask leading questions and to be able to summarize the statement Detective Herrera wrote about the interview he had with Ms. Landowski.
Ms. Johnson said that the witness was “conveniently forgetting a lot of things,” and the prosecution needed the reading of the statement to prove Landowski was making inconsistent statements.
Ms. Sequeira’s argument was that Ms. Landowski only said that she did not remember what happened in the interview with Detective Herrera, and that was not inconsistent with what she said. The defense also argued that the “statement” was really a summary of what happened in the interview.
There is nothing quoted in the summary and it was written five months after the interview happened, so Ms. Sequeria argued that it doesn’t qualify as a statement.
Judge Maguire ruled that, until Detective Herrera takes the stand to introduce and testify to the interview, both attorneys could not ask Ms. Landowski any questions about the interview, making her subject for recall.
When Sequeria started asking Landowksi questions on the witness stand, it was made clear that Landowski did not know that Reyes had a gun on him while he was in the car with her, and she had no prior knowledge that he was going to shoot anybody.
Ms. Landowksi said she has a faint memory of the incident, saying she did not remember if the car made a complete stop and did not remember seeing anybody on bikes. She said she was not paying attention, “I was oblivious,” Ms. Landowski said.
The second witness ending the trial day was Mr. Sotelo’s ex-wife, who was in custody because of parole violations. The second witness was only on the stand for around 10 to 15 minutes, and was getting nervous as Ms. Johnson pressed into her past criminal history.
The witness asked what her past had to do with what she was there to testify for, the shooting of her ex-husband. Judge Maguire reassured her that the prosecution was only asking her questions they thought served a purpose for the jury to know. Ms. Johnson reassured her that nothing was going to happen to her.
The witness described what happened when her ex-husband was shot. She said they were both on separate bikes and a white Mustang pulled up by them, with Mr. Sotelo continually telling her to “go” after somebody got out of the car and approached him.
