VAN BUREN -- A Van Buren man was sentenced to 25 years in prison Friday after a Crawford County Circuit Court jury convicted him of first-degree murder in the 2015 shotgun slaying of his brother.
Circuit Judge Gary Cottrell followed the jury's recommendation in sentencing Curtis Roberts, 57.
The quiet, frail-looking man in an ill-fitting gray suit stood before Cottrell with his attorney, Public Defender Ryan Norris, as Cottrell sentenced him to 20 years on the first-degree murder conviction and an additional five years for committing the felony with a firearm.
The sentences will be served consecutively, and Roberts will be eligible for parole after serving 70 percent of each sentence.
Roberts took the stand in his own defense Friday. He said he believed he shot his brother accidentally by having the trigger depressed as he loaded the shell so that it went off as soon as it was injected into the chamber.
He told the jury of seven men and five women he was asleep in his recliner around 11:30 p.m. Nov. 18, 2015. He and his brother had been drinking that night. He said he had drunk two beers and a couple shots of tequila to deaden the pain from neuropathy in his legs. His younger brother Michael had finished off a six pack.
He awoke to Michael Roberts sitting on his lap and pounding on his face with his fist, he said. He was aware of four punches but said Michael Roberts may have punched him more before he awoke because he remembered having trouble breathing with blood and broken teeth in his mouth as he woke up.
Hospital records showed no broken teeth and only a cut over the eye that a Van Buren police officer testified on Thursday was closed with glue and a bandage.
Curtis Roberts said he threw his brother off him and told Michael Roberts he was going to get the phone in his bedroom, call the police and have him arrested. He said Michael stood in his way and told him he wasn't going to let him call the police.
Curtis Roberts said he turned and walked to the other side of the living room, where his gun safe stood in a corner, and began working the dial combination to unlock the safe. All the while, he said, his brother was telling him he wouldn't shoot him and that Michael Roberts was "going to have his way in this situation."
He said as he put a shell in the Browning 12-gauge semi-automatic shotgun, Michael Roberts started to come at him. He feared for his life at the time he shot his brother, he said.
"He was terribly, terribly mad about something, but I don't know what it was," he said.
During cross-examination, Prosecuting Attorney Marc McCune pointed out several differences in his testimony from the statement he gave a Van Buren police detective the morning after the shooting.
Curtis Roberts said in the interview with Donald Eversole that his cellphone was next to him as he sat in the recliner, and he never mentioned needing to fetch it from his room to call the police.
Curtis Roberts said in his police statement that he didn't know what his brother was doing just before he shot him, contradicting his testimony Friday that Michael Roberts was coming at him, even though, McCune pointed out, there was a coffee table and a sofa between them.
McCune told jurors in his closing arguments it was unlikely Michael Roberts was charging at his brother when he was shot because the shotgun wound was on the left side of his head behind the ear.
State Desk on 02/11/2017