THE CHILD WITNESSES

 

 

Terjen Russell (8 years old)

Terjen wasn’t considered a significant witness to the extent that she was not interviewed on the night of the shooting.

 

Yet she became the star child witness during the trial.

 

She testified that she recognised Freddie McNeill as he lived next door to her and that she saw Freddie pull a gun from his back pocket, shoot a man through the ear, run between the houses after the shooting and then ran into a lady’s house and hide in a closet under some clothes.

 

She admitted in the witness box that she didn’t actually see the shooting because she ran inside when she knew the shooting was about to take place, that she knew the man was shot in the ear because ‘someone told me that’ and that she knew he went and hid in a closet because ‘someone told me that’.

 

Terjen’s evidence became more confused when she stated Freddie was sitting on his mum’s car when the other car pulled up and that she was talking to him.

 

According to the other children’s evidence, Terjen was inside the house at the time of the shooting and did not witness anything.

 

 

Brittany Pasenow (7 years old)

Brittany was outside playing at the time of the shooting.

 

Her evidence in direct examination was that the defendant in court was the shooter.

 

Her evidence in cross-­‐examination was that she was ‘not sure’ that the defendant in court was the shooter.

 

Her evidence in redirect examination by the prosecutor was that she couldn’t identity the suspect from photos, that she didn’t know his name, that she had never seen him before the day of the shooting and that the shooter had a hat on so she really couldn’t see his face.

 

Her evidence in redirect examination by defense was that after the shooting she had been shown 6 different photos and that she could not identify anyone.

 

 

 

Ronald George ‘Junior’ (6 years old)

Ronald referred to the shooter as Freddie when giving his evidence explaining that Freddie had once attended his baby friend Jack’s house.

 

Ronald admitted that after the shooting, he was shown a photo array consisting of 3 photos and that he had failed to identify the shooter.

 

 

 

Chris Sallee (7 years old)

Chris gave evidence that Freddie shot the guy and that he knew his name was Freddie because ‘Terjen told me’.