Tag: Scott Allen

Scott Allen was sentenced to death by the State of North Carolina for a murder that took place following a prison escape

According to court documents Scott Allen would escape from a North Carolina prison and bounce around staying in front of the authorities

Scott Allen would murder Christopher Gailey as the man had allegedly insulted his girlfriend

Scott Allen would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death

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Scott Allen Case

In 1998, Scott Allen escaped from a North Carolina Department of Corrections work release program. Shortly after fleeing, he reunited with Smith, with whom he had maintained an on-again, off-again romantic relationship. The couple drifted from hotel to hotel, living off settlement proceeds Smith received after her father’s death. Allen and Smith regularly purchased and used large quantities of illegal drugs together. To evade detection, Allen obtained a friend’s birth certificate and driver’s license issued by the State of Washington. While travelling through Colorado, Allen became romantically involved with another woman, and Allen and Smith split up. The former couple returned to North Carolina separately in the spring of 1999. That summer, they began living together in a mobile home owned by a friend, Robert Johnson, near the Uwharrie National Forest. Various friends and acquaintances lived in the mobile home while Smith and Allen resided in it, including Gailey, Allen’s friend and sometimes drug dealer.

¶ 6 Sometime during the afternoon of 9 July 1999, Scott Allen, Smith, and Gailey entered the Uwharrie National Forest. At some point that evening, somebody shot and killed Gailey. His body was later found by a passerby driving an all-terrain vehicle. Smith eventually told law enforcement Allen killed Gailey to steal his money and drugs. Both Allen and Smith were charged with murder.

¶ 7 Approximately two weeks before Scott Allen was brought to trial, Smith—who by that time had spent approximately twenty-three months in jail—entered into an agreement with the State. In exchange for her testimony against Allen, the State would drop the murder charges against her, and she would plead guilty to a lesser offense. At trial, Smith testified that Allen was the sole person responsible for Gailey’s death and that Allen acted in cold blood. According to Smith, Allen assassinated Gailey by shooting him from behind, unprovoked, as they walked along a path in the woods.

¶ 8 Because Scott Allen did not testify, Smith provided the sole narrative of the events directly precipitating Gailey’s death. As we explained in our decision resolving Allen’s direct appeal, Smith was “a witness with less-than-perfect credibility.” Allen , 360 N.C. at 306, 626 S.E.2d 271. She was a chronic heavy drug user who admitted to smoking marijuana shortly before Gailey’s death. She was involved in a tumultuous romantic relationship with Allen which he had recently broken off. She accused Allen of Gailey’s murder only after confronting him in Denver, Colorado, where Allen had reunited with a different ex-girlfriend. She testified at the trial pursuant to a deal with the State which significantly reduced her potential criminal liability.

¶ 9 According to Smith’s account of events, on 9 July 1999, Scott Allen told her and Gailey he had stashed weapons in a cabin in the Uwharrie National Forest, which he thought they could recover and trade for money and cocaine. The trio left together in Gailey’s truck to retrieve the weapons sometime in the afternoon, while it was still light out. The party began walking along a path through the forest. Gailey was carrying a duffel bag and a .45-caliber handgun. Allen carried a sawed-off shotgun. During the walk, Gailey and Allen used powder cocaine. Smith smoked marijuana. Smith testified that after at least an hour of walking, the path narrowed, and the three proceeded single file with Gailey leading the way, followed by Allen and then Smith.

¶ 10 At some point, Scott Allen allegedly turned around, shoved Smith to the ground, and then without provocation began shooting at Gailey with the shotgun. Smith did not see Allen shoot Gailey, but she recounted hearing multiple gunshots. Smith and Allen then waited for “seven or eight hours” in a nearby cabin for Gailey to die. While they were waiting, Allen would periodically crawl towards Gailey’s body and throw rocks at him to ascertain whether Gailey was still alive. When Allen and Smith finally left the cabin, they heard Gailey empty his .45-caliber handgun.

¶ 11 Allen and Smith left the forest together in Gailey’s truck. Smith retrieved Gailey’s wallet and their belongings from the mobile home. The two then drove to Shallotte and then to Albemarle in search of cocaine. However, by this point, Smith’s memory had begun to deteriorate due to her drug use.

¶ 12 According to multiple witnesses, Smith and Allen ended up at a party at the home of one of Smith’s friends, where they encountered a man named Jeffrey Lynn Page, who would later testify at Allen’s trial. According to Page, who had never previously met Allen, Allen admitted that he had just shot a man in the Uwharrie National Forest and was looking to offload the dead man’s truck. Allen told Page he had thrown rocks at Gailey’s body to confirm he was dead because Allen knew Gailey was armed. Page bought Allen’s truck at well below market value and then flipped it to a South Carolina junk dealer for a profit. Like Smith, Page was also charged in connection with Gailey’s death—he was indicted for being an accessory after the fact to Gailey’s murder—and testified at Allen’s trial pursuant to an agreement with the State.

¶ 13 Sometime after selling Gailey’s truck, Allen returned to Denver. Smith testified that one of her former romantic partners, who she reunited with shortly after Gailey’s death, loaned her money and a car to travel to Denver where she was able to track down Allen. Allen and Smith fought. Smith returned to North Carolina. Upon her return, Smith went to law enforcement to accuse Allen of murdering Gailey.

The former romantic partner subsequently filed a police report and testified at Allen’s trial that rather than loaning Smith the money and her car, Smith stole both items.

¶ 14 Law enforcement officers who examined the crime scene discovered the following evidence:

• A .45-caliber semi-automatic handgun between Gailey's feet, loaded with a magazine containing five live rounds, and one spent .45-caliber shell casing jammed in the receiver;

• A number of live rounds of .45-caliber ammunition next to Gailey;

• A magazine containing live rounds several feet from Gailey's head;

• A black t-shirt draped over a rock with another smaller rock on top of it, approximately four feet from Gailey's body;

• A nylon handgun holster;

• Five expended shotgun shells;

• A hunting knife located on top of a duffel bag;

• A yellow container with $1,944.00 in cash on Gailey's body.

According to the State’s forensic pathologist, Gailey died from two gunshot wounds, one to the back of his right shoulder from close range and another to his right knee from a further distance. In the pathologist’s opinion, Gailey probably lost consciousness “within a matter of minutes” of sustaining his injuries, and it was “extremely unlikely” Gailey survived for more than an hour or two after he was shot.

¶ 15 The State’s case rested primarily on the testimony of Smith and Page. No fingerprint, DNA, or forensic evidence connecting Allen to the crime scene was ever produced, nor was the alleged murder weapon—Allen’s sawed off-shogun—ever located. The jury was instructed on the offense of first-degree murder and the lesser included offenses of second-degree murder and voluntary manslaughter. During closing argument, the State emphasized Smith’s testimony that Allen had thrown rocks at Gailey’s body while they waited for hours for Gailey to die in seeking to persuade the jury to convict on a theory of malice, premeditation, and deliberation. Eschewing Smith’s initial theory that Allen murdered Gailey for his money, the State argued in closing that Allen killed Gailey “to keep him from ratting [Allen] out … [and] to keep [Allen] from being arrested for his year-long rampage.” The jury found Allen guilty of first-degree murder.

¶ 16 During the sentencing phase, the State submitted three aggravating circumstances to the jury: (1) the murder was committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest; (2) the murder was committed for pecuniary gain; and (3) the murder was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel. Allen’s trial counsel submitted one statutory mitigating circumstance and fourteen non-statutory mitigating circumstances. The jury determined the State had proven all three aggravating circumstances beyond a reasonable doubt. Allen established only two non-statutory mitigating circumstances—that he had been deeply affected by the death of his grandfather and that Allen’s death would have a detrimental impact on his family. The jury found the mitigating circumstances insufficient to outweigh the aggravating circumstances and that the aggravating circumstances, when considered with the mitigating circumstances, were sufficiently substantial to call for the imposition of the death penalty. Allen was sentenced to death.

https://casetext.com/case/state-v-allen-122388