VAN BUREN -- Curtis Roberts called 911 on Nov. 18, 2015, to tell a police dispatcher that he had just shot his brother in the head with a shotgun, jurors in a Crawford County Circuit Court trial were told Thursday.
"My brother was beating the crap out of me, and I went ahead and got revenge and shot him with a 12-gauge shotgun," Roberts said in a recording of the 911 call that was played for the jury of seven men and five women.
When Van Buren police dispatcher Mandy Roy asked if Roberts' brother, Michael, was dead, Roberts replied, "Yeah. I shot him right in the head."
Roberts, 57, faces charges of first-degree murder and committing a felony with a firearm.
In his opening statement, Public Defender Ryan Norris said his client acted in self-defense and as a result of a continuing pattern of abuse by his older brother.
He told jurors that Curtis Roberts was justified to defend himself from an attack in his own home. Roberts was drowning in his own blood and spitting out teeth during the attack, Norris told jurors.
Van Buren police officer Colton Mays testified that when he drove Roberts to the hospital after the shooting, he was treated for a cut over his right eye but had lost no teeth.
In the video recording of Roberts' interview with Van Buren police detective Donald Eversole, Roberts said the brothers had been drinking beer on the night of Nov. 18 in the home the two shared at 412 N. 24th St. Roberts said he also had drunk a couple of shots of tequila.
He was asleep in his recliner in the living room about 11:30 p.m. when he woke up to his brother on top of him punching him in the face.
Curtis Roberts said he got up and went to the gun safe that stood in a corner of the living room, entered the combination to open the safe, took out a Browning 12-gauge shotgun, slipped in a No. 4 shot shell, pointed it at his brother who stood about 10 feet away and fired the single round into the left side of Roberts' head just behind the ear, killing him instantly.
Curtis Roberts spent most of the interview sitting in the small room with his chin on his chest and answering Eversole's questions slowly.
He couldn't say what his brother was doing during the time between the beating and when he fired the shot, although he said Michael Roberts was "running his mouth."
At one point in the interview, which was conducted about seven hours after the shooting, Roberts asked Eversole if his brother was dead.
"Am I a murderer?" he asked.
Roberts had trouble answering questions about his actions after the shooting and before he called the police. Eversole testified that investigators came across three photographs in Michael Roberts' cellphone of him lying dead on the floor clad in his bathrobe and slippers.
Roberts also said he didn't know why his brother attacked him. He told Eversole that they were not fighting before the shooting. He said they didn't fight much in the six months the brothers had lived together, and he couldn't remember Michael ever punching him before.
"I honestly don't know why he started punching me in the face," he said.
Testimony continues this morning before Circuit Judge Gary Cottrell.
NW News on 02/10/2017