POTEAU, Okla. -- Witnesses in the trial of a man accused of killing a Fort Smith woman began testifying Thursday in support of the defense theory that his brother committed the crime.
Randy Studie, a cousin of Elvis Aaron Thacker and his brother, Johnathen, testified before a LeFlore County, Okla., District Court jury that when the brothers were younger, they were mistreated by male friends of their mother, Marsha Gregory.
When they were 5 or 6, Studie said, he recalled them being locked in their bedrooms. Ropes were tied to the doorknobs and boards were nailed across the doors to keep them secure.
At times, he said, Elvis Thacker was made to stand in the corner all day. At other times, if all three brothers -- including William Thacker -- were fighting, Elvis Thacker would be singled out for punishment.
Studie said he never saw Gregory kiss Elvis, but she would give candy to Johnathen and hold him up to the other siblings as her favorite.
The brothers' uncle, Tommy Osman, testified that when the brothers were younger, they often asked if he would take them home to live with him and his wife because of the abusive situation in which they lived.
He said he and his wife believed the brothers were starved because when they visited Osman's farm, and at other times, they told him that they were hungry.
Osman said he noticed that as Johnathen Thacker grew older, he seemed to become depressed and would say that he wanted to die.
Elvis Thacker is on trial on charges of first-degree murder and forcible rape in the Sept. 13, 2010, death of Briana Ault, 22, at a secluded pond in Pocola, Okla., just across the state line from Fort Smith in Arkansas. Her throat was cut.
Oklahoma is seeking the death penalty for Thacker.
Johnathen Thacker also was charged in the case with his brother but pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in April 2014 in exchange for his testimony against his brother and to avoid the death penalty. He testified last week that he believed he will be sentenced after Elvis Thacker's trial to life in prison without parole.
The lead attorney in Elvis Thacker's defense, Gretchen Mosley with the Oklahoma Indigent Defense System, told jurors she believes Johnathen Thacker killed Ault and blamed his brother.
She said the defense contended Johnathen was obsessed with sex and had wanted to be a serial killer since he was 12 as a result of the psychological trauma he developed from his abusive upbringing.
Both he and his brother used Elvis Thacker's cellphone, Mosley said, and Johnathen Thacker used it to ask Ault to leave a bar and give him a ride to Texas Road where he directed her to the pond.
Elvis Thacker was recovering from a broken leg he suffered in a traffic accident a month earlier and could not have moved around as Johnathen Thacker testified he did in committing the slaying, Mosley has told jurors.
A former neighbor when the brothers lived together at the Holly Avenue Apartments in south Fort Smith, Jesse Shipman, testified that Elvis Thacker always took care of his brother like a father but that the larger Johnathen Thacker was hard to control.
Shipman said Johnathen Thacker once became angry and almost hit Elvis Thacker after trying to cash a paycheck stub of his brother's at a bank thinking it was an actual check. But Elvis Thacker, as usual, was able to calm him down and get him under control, Shipman said.
Elvis Thacker didn't trust his brother and was concerned about him, Shipman said. He said Johnathen Thacker would spend money on beer and cigarettes that Elvis Thacker had given him to buy necessities.
Joyce Thompson, an employee at Southern Steel and Wire Co. in south Fort Smith at the time of Ault's death, testified that she saw a car, later identified as Ault's Chevrolet Cavalier, speed by the plant on Tulsa Street. It was before dawn, she said, but she couldn't recall the day or year.
She said she thought the car was going too fast to make the turn where Tulsa Street ended at the end of the block.
She said she heard a boom as the car hit chunks of concrete where the street turned into a short overgrown track and saw that the vehicle was on fire. As she grabbed a fire extinguisher and ran out the door, she said, she saw one person running from the scene.
In cross examination, First Assistant District Attorney Margaret Nicholson confronted Thompson with her interview that was videotaped by a Fort Smith police officer Sept. 13, 2010, when Ault's car was found burning blocks from where the Thacker brothers were staying.
Johnathen Thacker testified the brothers ditched the car there after driving away from the pond where they had left Ault's body.
In the 2010 interview, Thompson said she saw the car go by too fast, but went back to work and noticed nothing else until she heard firetrucks arrive.
Testimony resumes at 8:30 a.m. today.
State Desk on 04/22/2016