Murder Charge Dropped Against Man Linked to Ambush Killing

A Van Nuys Superior Court judge on Monday dismissed a murder charge against a Los Angeles man whose trial in the ambush slaying of a police officer ended in a mistrial.

Judge Kathryne Ann Stoltz said she saw “no reasonable likelihood” that a second trial would result in conviction of Duane Moody, 30, who was accused of supplying the weapon used to gun down Los Angeles Police Detective Thomas C. Williams, 40, on Halloween, 1985.

Defense attorney James Epstein said he expected Moody to be released from County Jail late Monday and predicted there would be no effort to retry him. “Under California law, a decision like this is virtually unappealable,” he said.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard L. Jenkins conceded that Epstein “might be right about that. I haven’t researched it yet. We’ll be making a decision soon.”

Stoltz declared a mistrial on the murder charge against Moody on March 20 after jurors said they were deadlocked, 10 to 2, in favor of acquittal. The jury earlier had acquitted Moody on a charge of conspiracy to commit murder.

5 Charged With Murder

Moody was one of five men charged with first-degree murder in the Williams slaying.

The same jury that deadlocked on the murder charge against Moody convicted Voltaire Williams, 26, in February of conspiracy to commit murder, but acquitted him of murder.

In March, that jury acquitted Reecy Clem Cooper, 34, of both charges.

Two other men, Daniel Jenkins, 33, and Rubin Antonio Moss, 26, were convicted of murder in a separate trial last year. Daniel Jenkins has been sentenced to die in the gas chamber, and Moss has been sentenced to life imprisonment.

Moody admitted furnishing the automatic assault weapon that was used to kill the detective when the victim stopped at a Canoga Park church school to pick up his young son. Epstein said Monday that jurors believed Moody’s statement that he gave the gun to Jenkins “out of fear and intimidation.”

Moody “tried to avoid Jenkins for days before giving him the gun,” Epstein said, “and when he finally gave it to him, he put glue on the safety so it wouldn’t be usable.”

A defense expert testified at the trial that glue was present on the safety.