A jury convicted a Gary man Friday after two hours in a 23-year-old man’s death on Chase Street last year.
Virgil King, 23, was convicted of murder and unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon, a Lake County Prosecutor’s Office spokeswoman said.
His sentencing date is July 18, according to court filings.
At trial, the victim’s mother ZsaKenya Mathews said she found her son, Daqwuan Walker, 23, fatally shot on Jan. 25, 2023 outside the building on the 500 block of Chase Street where they lived.
Authorities implicated two men. Co-defendant Micah Sanders, 25, signed a plea deal last week. His DNA was found on a Stoeger handgun tied to all but one bullet casing at the crime scene. A second gun was found two days later.
Sanders faces 45 years, if Judge Gina Jones accepts the deal.
Toward the end of closing arguments Friday, Deputy Prosecutor Maureen Koonce admitted the evidence against King was “circumstantial.”
She argued video showed Sanders and King casing the neighborhood two hours before the shooting, and were caught on security tape leaving the crime scene.
Afterward, they regrouped in an alley and were arrested together within 30 minutes of the shooting at a woman’s apartment just over a half-mile southeast on the 2500 block of Waverly Drive.
Investigators were not able to identify direct witnesses or video. Even so, Koonce argued, King was “just as guilty,” because she argued he was in on the crime, a legal term known as accomplice liability.
“It doesn’t matter who pulled the trigger,” she told jurors. “That’s what the law says.”
Defense lawyer Adam Tavitas said prosecutors didn’t have the evidence.
“I think he was a part of it” was “not good enough,” he said. Their case was based on “assumptions.”
Mathews testified Tuesday that a young woman with Walker that morning ran when the shooting started. She couldn’t remember her name, but said she ran into her in Gary earlier this year.
On the stand Thursday, Det. James Nielsen said despite his repeated best efforts — tracking down video to see where she ran, combing through Walker’s social media and cell phone — he never learned her name or located her for the trial.
Tavitas said there were too many holes in the evidence.
Other than the woman, the owner of a truck seen in the background never replied to police to give an interview.
Nielsen said he tried multiple times last year and again Tuesday — when the trial was already running, Tavitas noted. The detective testified he couldn’t force people to cooperate.
Evidence showed the lethal shots came from the Stoeger handgun, which had Sanders’ DNA, the lawyer said.
The second gun — a Glock handgun — was discovered two days later by a witness who lived at the Waverly Drive apartment. The weapon was at the bottom of a laundry basket he took to a relative’s place to wash clothes.
It had a mix of Sanders’, King’s and Walker’s DNA, an expert testified Thursday. One bullet casing was not linked to the Stoeger gun, but couldn’t be conclusively linked to the Glock, Tavitas said.
There was “no evidence” King fired it, the lawyer said.
Police did the best they could to compile a criminal case under difficult circumstances, Koonce said.
The woman who lived at the Waverly address stopped cooperating with prosecutors. Her testimony from a bond hearing last year was read out loud Thursday. Her relative, who gave the men a ride and directed them to the Waverly apartment didn’t show up to testify for the trial.
Mathews, emotional Tuesday after her testimony, said her son was a “good father” and “strong, happy person.” He had “no trouble” with anyone.
Police were called at 8:17 a.m. on Jan. 25, 2023, to the 500 block of Chase Street in Gary where Walker was lying lifeless on his back near the home’s front stoop, according to court records.
Police found several 9-millimeter bullet casings nearby.
A witness told police Walker was walking back from a gas station around 6 a.m. when gunshots rang out, according to court records.
Police discovered a dog had been shot dead on the 500 block of Taney Street not long after Walker’s slaying. It was the same bullet type, the affidavit alleges.
A K-9 dog tracked a scent from the crime scene to the same house on the 500 block of Taney, then stopped at a house on the 2500 block of Waverly Drive, five blocks away from the murder scene, charges state.
Officers surrounded the home. A man appeared to try crawling out a back window with possibly a gun in his pocket before closing it shut. Officers arrested King and Sanders, according to the affidavit. A woman and several kids were inside.
A witness told police King and Sanders knocked on the door asking to come inside and he knew them “through our (relative).”
The men were inside for 10 minutes before police came, according to court documents.
