Boxer Jermain Taylor's lawyers told a Pulaski County circuit judge Monday that they're prepared for the former champion's first trial over accusations he threatened a family of five by firing a gun during Little Rock's Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade.
Defense attorney Hubert Alexander said the only thing that could require asking for a delay is to conduct further investigation into the background of Thelton Pegro Smith, the 38-year-old father of three who says Taylor threatened him and his family with a gun.
Smith's credibility will be important at Taylor's Dec. 2 trial on terroristic threatening and aggravated assault charges, Alexander told Judge Leon Johnson.
Alexander told the judge that Smith's criminal record is "pretty extensive."
Taylor faces up to 36 years in prison over the Martin Luther King Jr. Day accusations.
Taylor had a gun in his pocket when officers arrested him that January day after a brief pursuit, police said.
Taylor also is awaiting trial on other charges over accusations he shot his cousin and punched another man in separate incidents.
Court records and police reports show that Taylor's accuser served prison time for participating in four shootings, escaped an attempt on his life when he was 18 that killed a 15-year-old boy, testified in court that he was a gang member and drug dealer, and has been known to go by the nickname "Mad Dog."
Smith received his first of eight felony convictions, second-degree battery, when he was a 15-year-old ninth-grader for punching Dunbar Junior High School basketball coach Curtis Lang in December 1988. He was assessed a $5,000 fine in 1989 after being convicted at trial.
In 1991, Little Rock police connected then-18-year-old Smith to four shootings between that July and September that killed a boy and wounded two other people
Smith would accept a 13-year prison sentence for two counts of first-degree battery and three aggravated assault charges for three shootings.
He admitted to being the driver in a July 1991 drive-by shooting in which Dan Anderson Jr., 38, was wounded with a shotgun in the 2900 block of Arch Street.
The trigger man in that case, Austin Augusta Jones, now 42, was sentenced to seven years in prison for first-degree battery, court records show.
Smith also admitted participating in a shooting the following month that targeted four teenagers at 21st and Lewis Streets.
One of the teens, 16-year-old Nakia Taylor, was wounded in the stomach. The others -- Faye Jacobs, Tasha Owens and Senetedias Matthews -- were uninjured.
Nakia Taylor identified Smith as the driver of the car. Jones was accused of being the gunman, but court records show the charges were dropped for lack of evidence.
In September 1991, Smith admitted firing shots at Marva Lee, also known as Meko Skinner, of Pine Bluff and Gerald Kelly, neither of whom was injured, court filings show.
Court filings show that the same September day Smith shot at Lee and Kelly, a 16-year-old boy, John "Yellow Boy" Scott, was gunned down while walking with Smith on West 23rd Street between South Gaines and State streets in Little Rock.
Arrested the night of the slaying, Ronnie Eugene Jones, now 59, told police he had shot the boy by accident, saying he was shooting to try to protect himself from Smith.
Jones, described in police reports as crying, said he was driving down the street when he pulled over to talk to Smith about "an altercation" they had been in earlier. The reports don't say what that altercation was, but Lee was one of the passengers in the car with Jones.
Jones said Smith pulled a gun on him and threatened to kill him while using the boy as a shield, according to police reports. Smith was the first to fire, Jones said, saying he got his gun and returned fire.
Jones pleaded guilty in August 1992 to second-degree murder, reduced from capital murder, for the killing in exchange for a 35-year prison sentence.
Questioned by detectives six days after Scott was killed, Smith told police that Jones had pulled up next to him and Scott, leaned out of the car and opened fire.
Scott had a gun but dropped it, Smith said. He told police he picked up the weapon, took cover behind a tree and fired seven rounds in the shoot-out with Jones.
"I was so afraid, you know. I guess he was fixing to kill me," Smith told investigators. "I had this gun in my hand. The best thing to do is to shoot, shoot back, trying to defend myself 'cause I know he was going to try to kill me."
Smith said he met Jones when they shared a jail cell about a month before the shooting, but didn't know why the man would want to kill him.
Smith speculated that Jones was out to get him because he'd alerted his cousin's girlfriend that Jones was trying to hire someone to kill her because Jones blamed her for getting him arrested earlier in 1991.
Police also told reporters at the time that the shooting was the result of a feud between Smith and Jones because Smith apparently owed Jones some money.
Eight years later, known by the nickname "Mad Dog," Smith and another man, Ronald Hamp West, then 34, were charged with kidnapping and armed robbery.
They were accused of holding Tonya Ash and Jeff Trimble, then 24 and 32, at gunpoint at Ash's West 20th Street home in April 1999 while demanding Trimble give them the $8,600 he had just won at a Tunica, Miss., casino.
But at trial in November 1999, Smith and West were acquitted on all charges after Smith testified that Trimble was his drug supplier and that he was at the home only to pick up a new shipment of cocaine from Trimble and give him some money.
When Trimble asked for $1,000 more than he had originally requested, Smith told jurors that he got angry, and the two struggled.
Ash and Trimble's versions of the events differed substantially in police reports. Trimble said he knew West and Smith from bowling together.
Smith told police that he and Trimble were members of the same gang and that he had been sent to Trimble's home to frighten him into returning money and drugs that Trimble owed the gang.
Smith ran afoul of the law again in November 2004, court records show, when Little Rock police caught him with a gun. Police found a .38-caliber revolver at Smith's feet in the back seat of a car stopped at Baseline and Geyer Springs roads.
He pleaded guilty to being a felon in possession of a firearm in October 2005 in exchange for five years on probation. He later moved to the Atlanta suburb of Stone Mountain, Ga., court records show.
Eight months after the move, prosecutors filed to revoke his probation after he was arrested in a domestic dispute in Georgia.
In February 2009, after pleading guilty to the revocation, his Pulaski County probation was extended until 2014, and he was fined $500.
Georgia court records show he pleaded guilty to cruelty to children, interfering with a call for emergency help and misdemeanor battery in March 2006 and was sentenced to two years of probation.
Metro on 11/03/2015