KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) _ The man accused of murdering a 3-year-old girl nicknamed “Precious Doe” after her headless body was found in the woods didn’t mean to kill her when he kicked her in the head, a defense attorney told a Jackson County jury Monday.
In his opening statement, defense lawyer Kenton Hall admitted that Harrell Johnson kicked his girlfriend’s daughter, Erica Green, in April 2001 after the girl refused to go to bed, forcing her head to strike the floor. But Hall said it was not the premeditated act necessary for a first-degree murder conviction.
“Erica Green died of a single, traumatic blow to the head, a blow that was forceful and reckless and out of control but was not intended to kill,” Hall said.
Special prosecutor Tim Dollar countered that Johnson, 29, of Muskogee and the girl’s mother, Michelle Johnson, did commit murder by failing to seek medical help as Erica lay dying for hours and possibly days. Instead, the mother tried to revive Erica with a cold bath and even attempted to feed her with an eyedropper.
“The defendant and Michelle decided that they would not call for help for little Erica because the defendant and Michelle were ‘on the run’ from the police and neither this defendant nor Michelle wanted to go to jail,” Dollar said.
Among the first witnesses Monday was a pediatric neurosurgeon who testified that if the couple had quickly sought medical attention for Erica, physicians could likely have reversed the damage.
“I think she would have survived,” said Dr. Gregory Hornig, who reviewed records from the girl’s autopsy.
Prosecutors claim that after Erica died, the couple took the girl’s body out of the house and that Harrell Johnson decapitated her with a pair of hedge clippers and dumped the body in the woods.
Hall cautioned jurors, who viewed gruesome crime scene and autopsy photos of the girl’s severed head and neck, that the decapitation didn’t cause the girl’s death and was meant only to hide her identity.
“You are here to judge what happened before that moment,” he said.
Erica’s headless body was discovered in a wooded Kansas City park area on April 28, 2001, by a Kansas City police officer searching for an elderly man who had wandered from his home.
Police Sgt. Jason Rusley testified Monday that he thought he saw a dog or a toy lying in the bushes off a gravel road and took a closer look.
“I said a gasp and ‘Oh, no,’” he said. “You could tell it was the body of a young child.”
A volunteer searcher found her head three days later about two blocks away wrapped in a pair of garbage bags. Erica’s identity remained unknown until 2005.
Former Jackson County Medical Examiner Thomas Young testified that his autopsy of Erica’s body and head showed she died of a “closed head injury” caused when her brain struck the inside of the skull, an injury typically caused by an object hitting the head or the head hitting a stationary object.
In a videotaped deposition, Hornig confirmed Young’s findings and added that the parents would have surely noticed Erica’s symptoms, especially considering how long she survived after the incident. Harrell Johnson has estimated she died after 10 to 14 hours while Michelle Johnson has said her daughter lingered for two or three days.
Under cross-examination, Hornig agreed that he couldn’t tell what symptoms Erica exhibited other than unconsciousness and acknowledged that some symptoms, such as irregular heartbeat or slowed breathing, would be difficult to notice without medical training.
Dollar told jurors that police had hoped that media reports about the body being found would coax the girl’s parents to come forward or file a missing person’s report.
But “no call comes and no report comes,” Dollar said. “Instead, Kansas City’s long nightmare has begun.”
For four years, the case haunted residents who longed to know the identity of the girl they had nicknamed “Precious Doe” and who could have killed her in such horrific fashion.
Homicide Sgt. David Bernard testified that he initially thought the girl would be identified quickly because of her age. When that didn’t happen, he said the department used numerous drawings and clay busts of the girl’s likeness to drum up leads, even putting them on an episode of “America’s Most Wanted.”
Erica was finally identified in 2005 after Harrell Johnson’s grandfather in Muskogee tipped a Kansas City community activist who had kept the case in the spotlight. Johnson and the girl’s mother, who had married a year after Erica’s death, were arrested in Oklahoma.
Michelle Johnson pleaded guilty to second-degree murder last year and agreed to testify against her husband.
In his opening statement, Dollar said Michelle Green admitted her role after her arrest when police showed her a photograph of her daughter while she was alive. Dollar showed jurors the photo of Erica in a white dress. On the back, Michelle Johnson had written, “Mama is so sorry. You are always in my heart and soul. Love always, Little E.”
Harrell Johnson also wrote on the back of the photo, saying, “I’m so sorry that this happened and I hope you will forgive me for what I’ve done.”
