Cell Phone Records Helped Convict Murderer

The cops don’t routinely seek to obtain cell-phone records in a murder investigation. After the murder of Christian Garcia inside Brendan Towers, it seemed like a good idea.

That good idea paid off more than two years later, as a jury handed down a guilty verdict against Rashid Johnson in Garcia’s murder, which occurred in a dispute over a marijuana sale. The verdict came down on Friday.

(Click here to read the Register’s Randall Beach’s account of the verdict and trial. Click here for a previous story detailing how cops pieced together the case and then came upon the suspect to make the arrest in a Dominican restaurant in the Hill.)

Jurors eventually, after reaching an impasse on one charge, convicted Johnson on all four counts against him in the case, including felony murder.

The case ​“presented several challenges” both in the investigative and prosecutorial phases, noted Lt. Tony Reyes, head of the police department’s Major Crimes Unit. One of the biggest challenges: Superior Court Judge Jon C. Blue ruled that the state couldn’t use a crucial piece of evidence against Johnson — incriminating statements he had made to police after his arrest — because of an inadequate explanation of his Miranda rights.

The investigation ended up including enough other strong evidence to make the charges stick, Reyes said. These including a letter intercepted by the corrections department in which Johnson boasted that he could beat the rap. Another key piece of evidence: cell phone records showing calls between Garcia and Johnson.

“It depends on the case. We can’t just get people’s cell phone records to get it,” said lead Detective Bertram Ettienne (pictured). ​“We have to have probable cause, a belief that the cell phone records would yield incriminating information.” Ettienne said police started getting that idea when they learned, among other facts, that Garcia had been on the phone right before his murder. ​“That was the first clue we had to look at the phone records,” Ettienne said. His father later identified Johnson as having subsequently opened the door to Garcia’s apartment.

Both Ettienne and Reyes called the work of a host of patrol cops and detectives and the state’s attorney’s office with having led to the conviction.

“It was a team effort,” Ettienne said. ​“Justice has prevailed.”