A prosecutor used photos to describe in chilling and graphic detail the last moments in the lives of MAX train passengers Ricky Best and Taliesin Namkai-Meche before Jeremy Christian repeatedly jabbed a 4-inch knife into their necks and faces as horrified commuters watched.
As the double murder trial began Tuesday, prosecutor Don Rees told jurors that no one on the Green Line train realized Christian had pulled the folding knife out of the pocket of his baggy shorts when he got into a shoving match with passenger Micah Fletcher. Fletcher had told Christian to “shut up” and get off the train because Christian had launched into a loud hate-filled rant.
As Christian began stabbing, passengers thought the clash had turned into a fistfight, Rees said, before realizing blood was spurting from the men’s necks.
“One witness will tell you that ... she thought it was raining" before she recognized it wasn’t water falling but a spray of blood, Rees said.
“Some passengers had to climb over the bodies to get out of the MAX car,” Rees said.
Prosecutors and defense attorneys made their opening statements to a packed courtroom -- half of it filled with victims, including Fletcher, and members of the dead men’s families, including one of Best’s adult sons. Namkai-Meche’s parents and five of his siblings also attended.
Before court started, some of them hugged each other and talked.
Christian entered the courtroom and almost immediately blurted: “You guys ready to smash Portland’s fairy tale? ... Hate crime?” Christian indicated he was eager for those in the courtroom to watch video of the May 26, 2017, stabbings as the light-rail train pulled into the Hollywood Station.
He is charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of Best, 53, and Namkai-Meche, 23, the attempted first-degree murder of Fletcher, then 21, and second-degree intimidation for allegedly launching into a racist and xenophobic tirade against two teenage girls on the train, one who was wearing a hijab.
No one -- not even Christian’s defense team -- disputes that he stabbed the men. The trial will determine whether Christian, 37, should be held responsible, and if so, for what crimes.
During his opening remarks, Rees said Christian made the first two shoves -- at Fletcher, who had walked across part of the train to tell Christian to get off, and Namkai-Meche, who apparently was about to start recording Christian with his phone. Fletcher ended up shoving Christian three times before Christian started his stabbing spree with a knife to Fletcher’s jugular vein, Rees said.
“It happened so fast,” Rees said, referencing a still frame from video recorded on the train. “As you can see, Taliesin is still looking at his phone as the blade goes into Micah Fletcher’s neck.”
An instant later, Rees showed jurors a photo of the blade entering Namkai-Meche’s neck, piercing his carotid artery. The shock on Namkai-Meche’s face is apparent as his body shrinks away from Christian.
At that instant, Best stood up from his seat and Christian stabbed him, severing an artery between his cervical vertebrae, the prosecutor said. Christian stabbed Namkai-Meche and Best repeatedly in the neck and face, with force so powerful that one of Best’s molars broke, Rees said.
“The evidence will show Mr. Best wasn’t really doing anything,” Rees said. “He wasn’t saying anything. He wasn’t moving. He wasn’t waving his arms. He was just standing there.”
Rees added: “From start to finish that stabbing attack took 12 seconds. And again you’ll see on the video that none of the men who were on the video ever threw a punch.”
Rees said a prosecution expert is prepared to testify that Christian has anti-social personality disorder -- “the term for someone who disregards the rights of others, acts impulsively, acts aggressively and lacks remorse.”
Even though Fletcher shoved Christian, Christian’s response was vastly disproportionate and unreasonable, Rees said. “Taliesin and Ricky Best never made a fist," he said. "The video shows Ricky Best standing right before he was stabbed, kind of casually with his hands on his hips.”
After the stabbings, Christian fled about a mile before police caught up to him, thanks to witnesses who followed him and alerted 911 of his location.
“In his own words, Jeremy Christian said to police ... ‘I stabbed them in the neck, I hoped they died,’" Rees told jurors. Christian asserted to police that he was defending himself and that he was in the right, the prosecutor said.
As Rees spoke, Christian nodded his head vigorously in apparent agreement.
Defense attorney Dean Smith countered the prosecution’s characterization of Fletcher, Namkai-Meche and Best by saying all three men confronted Christian about his rant. The starkest contrast was the defense’s description of Best, who Smith said was “wrestling” with Christian before he was stabbed.
“When you are defending yourself against three attackers, you cannot successfully defend yourself with hands,” Smith said.
Smith did agree with the prosecution, however, that passengers were unaware that Christian had a knife.
“They thought it was a fistfight,” Smith said.
Smith said Christian responded reasonably after Fletcher unlawfully tried to oust him from the train because Christian was exercising his free speech. Smith said Namkai-Meche and Best joined in by ganging up on Christian, who was more vulnerable at the moment because he’d been drinking alcohol from a container he had with him and was unsteady on his feet.
Smith also described the encounter as “mutual combat.”
According to the defense team, one witness reported that Namkai-Meche allegedly told Christian, “You’re going to be an internet sensation” as he moved to record Christian on his cellphone.
“This was a situation not invited by Mr. Christian, he didn’t approach other people physically aggressively," Smith said. "They got in his face.”
Christian had reasonable concerns, the defense attorney said, because he didn’t know if Namkai-Meche and Best had “violent tendencies,” were “trained in martial arts” or had weapons on them.
On top of that, Christian has mental challenges that affected his perception of the circumstances, Smith said, noting that psychological experts for the defense have evaluated Christian and determined that Christian is on the autism spectrum, has slow processing speeds and focuses on details rather than the larger picture.
The defense contended Christian wasn’t acting out based on racist beliefs. Christian didn’t stab any racial minorities, including the teenage girls, that afternoon, Smith said.
“African Americans, other minorities, none of them were injured," he said. “This wasn’t some wild killing spree on the MAX that day. The only ones who were injured were the ones who confronted Mr. Christian."
One of the first witnesses called by the prosecution was the young woman, Walia Mohamed, who was wearing the hijab on the train. She was 17 at the time, and is now 20.
She said she felt targeted by Christian as he yelled: “Go back to Saudi Arabia” and “(Expletive) Muslims” and “Kill yourself.”
Mohamed, who immigrated from Somalia when she was about 5, ran from the train as soon as it stopped, she said.
“I thought he was going to come after us and kill us, too ... because of all the hateful things he was saying about Muslim people,” she said, wiping away tears at times during her testimony and avoiding eye contact with Christian.
She most often referred to Christian as “that man.” She said she has post traumatic stress disorder because of the encounter on the train, and she stopped wearing a hijab a few weeks later because she worries about being targeted again.
The friend who was with Mohamed, Destinee Mangum, testified Christian appeared to single her out because of her race and Mohamed because of her faith. Mangum, who was 16 at the time, is African American. She said Christian talked about Muslims, Christians and Jews dying.
“He kept bringing up death, die, and ‘Go back where you come from,’" she said. “... He said it’s not bad what the Nazi does, so I kind of figured he was Nazi at that point.”
The defense pressed Mangum about whether Christian specifically condemning Muslims. “He was quite clear that he had something against all three religions. Is that correct?” Smith asked her. “Yes,” Mangum responded.
The prosecution played cellphone video that Mangum took on the train. It shows Fletcher and Namkai-Meche being stabbed, and Mangum can be heard shrieking and screaming in the background just before sprinting away. As the video played on two large screens in the courtroom, Mangum buried her head in her jacket and cried.
Christian also is charged with second-degree intimidation for allegedly throwing a Gatorade bottle at the face of Demetria Hester, an African American woman, the night before he stabbed the men on the train. In all, Christian is charged with 12 crimes.
The trial continues Wednesday. It’s expected to last until the end of February.
-- Aimee Green
o_aimee
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