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156189 - People v Travis Sammons

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The People of the State of Michigan,

 

Carmen Fillmore

 

Plaintiff-Appellee,

 

v

(Appeal from Ct of Appeals)

 

 

(Saginaw – Jackson, D.)

 

Travis Travon Sammons,

 

Gaetan Gerville-Reache

 

Defendant-Appellant.

 
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Opinion
 
 

Summary

A jury convicted defendant Travis Sammons and his codefendant Dominique Ramsey, Jr., of conspiracy to commit open murder for the fatal shooting of Humberto Casas.   Independent eyewitnesses testified to the shooting.  One eyewitness identified the vehicle in which the assailants had fled and in which defendant and his codefendant were found eleven minutes after the shooting.  Another eyewitness positively identified defendant as the shooter in a lineup conducted at the police station hours after the shooting.  Defendant and his codefendant were jointly tried, and the jury found both guilty of conspiracy to commit open murder.  They each filed a motion for a directed verdict or a new trial.  The trial court denied defendant’s motion, holding that there was sufficient evidence to convict him of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, but granted the codefendant’s motion and acquitted him of conspiracy to commit murder.  Defendant appealed.  The Court of Appeals affirmed.  The Supreme Court, after ordering the prosecuting attorney to respond to defendant’s application for leave to appeal, has ordered oral argument on the application to address whether (1) the lineup identification procedure at the police station was impermissibly suggestive, see People v Kurylczyk, 443 Mich 289, 303-306 (1993); (2) if so, whether the identification was nonetheless sufficiently reliable to be admitted at trial, see Perry v New Hampshire, 565 US 228, 238-239 (2012); and (3) if improperly admitted, whether it is more probable than not that the erroneous admission of the detective’s identification testimony affected the outcome of the trial, see People v Lukity, 460 Mich 484, 496 (1999).​