For the second time in three years, James “Chuck” Newell was found guilty of manslaughter in the 2008 shooting death of Adrian Boyette.
The jury reached its verdict Friday, following a full day of deliberations that often became so heated that their arguments could be heard outside the jury room. The eight-man, four-woman jury seemed to be especially concerned with Newell’s emotional state at the time of the slaying. The jury sent a question for Judge Lee Coleman, Prosecutor Rhonda Ellis and Defense attorney William Starks, asking, “Does ‘the heat of passion’ mean manslaughter and therefore a vote of guilty?”
The jury was referring to one of several instructions they received before deliberations. Judge Coleman instructed the jury to consider all instructions, including the Castle Doctrine, if the crime was committed in self-defense, or, but not limited to, the heat of passion.
Before receiving clarification on that point, the jury sent another message to the judge announcing that they were dead-locked.
Coleman sent back an answer to the jury’s first question, stating “You are not to single out any instruction and ignore the other. The court instructs the jury to re-read all instructions given by the court.”
An hour later, the jury returned with its verdict.
Newell was convicted of manslaughter for the crime in 2009, but the Mississippi Supreme Court overturned the verdict and sent the case back for retrial.
Newell shot and killed Boyette after an altercation outside the Slab House, a bar on the outer limits of Lowndes County, near the Alabama state line.
Newell claimed self-defense in the slaying but the state alleged that Newell went to the bar that night with the mindset that he was going to kill someone.
Married for two weeks, Newell went to the Slab House with the suspicion that his wife was cheating on him. When he drove up, he saw Boyette standing beside his wife’s red truck. Newell questioned Boyette and the two got into an argument which quickly turned violent.
Newell claimed that when he tried to retreat to his truck, Boyette followed him and slammed the truck’s door on Newell’s legs. He added that Boyette began beating on the vehicle’s window, windshield and hood while yelling threats and obscenities. When Boyette grabbed the driver’s side door handle, Newell pushed the door, knocking Boyette back several feet.
Newell claimed Boyette then reached into his pocket and yelled “I’m going to cut you up!” Newell then grabbed a gun that was on the seat of his truck and fired once, striking Boyette in the chest. The defendant then fled the scene and drove to his home in Alabama.
Moments after the shooting, Newell’s wife Diane arrived back at the bar. Bartender Sheila Ray used Diane Newell’s phone to call Chuck Newell and asked him why he just shot and killed a man. He replied, “It’s Diane’s fault.”
Boyette was a stranger to both Chuck and Diane Newell. Ellis said Boyette was simply “in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Boyette’s mother, Peggy Boyette; his sister, Rachel Boyette; and fiancé, Diane O’Mary, were at the trial and were visibly upset during many portions of the testimony. When the guilty verdict was read, O’Mary began to sob.
“God was here today,” she said.
Boyette’s mother said the family has struggled since her son’s death.
“He was a very nice person, always having fun and he had a good heart,” Peggy Boyette said. “He would help anybody anyway he could. He has a six-year-old boy that will grow up never knowing his daddy. We were so close and it’s just hard to go day-to-day without him.”
Starks, Newell’s attorney, said he was surprised with the verdict.
“He was protecting his car and also, it was self defense,” Starks said. “I imagine we will be appealing the case. Some of that may depend on sentencing.”
Newell will be sentenced Sept. 7.
Sarah Fowler covered crime, education and community related events for The Dispatch.
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