jmccann@heraldsun.com; 419-6601
DURHAM -- Jurors returned a guilty verdict Monday in the first-degree murder trial of Shannon Crawley in the shooting death of N.C. Central University student Denita Smith.
Jurors asked Monday for one last chance to hear her audio tapes on which Crawley discussed the murder with the man whom Crawley's attorney said shot Smith.
It wasn't long before they came back with the guilty verdict. Superior Court Judge Ronald Stephens sentenced Crawley to prison for the rest of her life without the possibility for parole.
The tapes, which Crawley said she made secretly, include a man's voice making threats toward her and an admission of guilt. Crawley testified that the speaker on the tape was Smith's fiance and Crawley's lover, Jermeir Jackson-Stroud.
But, in the end, jurors agreed that Crawley killed Smith on Jan. 4, 2007.
Assistant District Attorney David Saacks described Smith as a star who was snuffed out by a bullet to the back of her head. Smith's body was found outdoors on the steps near where she lived at Campus Crossings apartments on East Cornwallis Road.
Working on a master's degree in English, recently welcomed into Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc. and engaged to be married to Jackson-Stroud, Greensboro police officer, the 25-year-old Smith was on top of the world, Saacks had told jurors.
But Smith's fiance put her in harm's way, the judge said.
"Jermeir Stroud caused a perfect storm to happen and walked away from it," Stephens said after the verdict.
Jackson-Stroud testified he was engaged to Smith while involved in a sexual relationship with Crawley, a 911 operator who wound up pregnant with his child. Crawley had an abortion, according to courtroom testimony.
Sharon Smith, the victim's mother, had angry words for Crawley.
"I hope you rot in hell," Sharon Smith said. "You took something from me."
But Crawley's sister blamed Jackson-Stroud for Smith's death.
"Shannon has to live the rest of her life behind bars because of him," Erin Crawley said.
Keith Crawley, Shannon Crawley's father, expressed disbelief that the jurors ruled the way they did after hearing the taped conversations between his daughter and the man whom she and her attorney alleged was Jackson-Stroud.
Jurors were allowed another look at photographs of Shannon Crawley's vehicle and home, and they also re-examined records of cell phone calls she and Jackson-Stroud made in 2007 between Jan. 3-5, the dates surrounding Smith's Jan. 4 murder. Those records indicate signals from Shannon Crawley's phone registered during that time period at a cell-phone tower near Campus Crossings, Saacks told jurors.
