Chase back to court for murder case

Cole County Public Defender Jan King, left, with his client, Brandon Chase, before the start of trial for Chase's part in the April 2012 shooting death of Keith Mosley Jr., was shot and killed during a drug deal turned robbery on Buena Vista Street.
Cole County Public Defender Jan King, left, with his client, Brandon Chase, before the start of trial for Chase's part in the April 2012 shooting death of Keith Mosley Jr., was shot and killed during a drug deal turned robbery on Buena Vista Street.

Fourteen weeks after a Cole County jury deadlocked on a verdict, Brandon Chase was back in court Tuesday, facing charges of second-degree murder, first-degree robbery and armed criminal action.

Two men and 12 women were selected Tuesday morning as jurors to hear the case surrounding the April 22, 2012, killing of Keith Mosely, Columbia.

When Chase first went to trial in March, the six-man, six-woman jury told Judge Dan Green they were deadlocked after only 3 1/2 -hour deliberation, and couldn't reach a unanimous verdict for either conviction or acquittal.

In his opening statement, Cole County Prosecutor Mark Richardson laid out the state's case - that Chase wanted to get some drugs, arranged to get some marijuana from Mosely, then organized a robbery so he could get the drugs without paying for them.

"Brandon Chase set up this robbery and involved himself in having this occur," Richardson said.

Since Mosely was killed during that robbery attempt, Richardson said, "The state will ask you to find Brandon Chase to be an accessory to robbery, and guilty of felony murder which resulted from the robbery."

But Public Defender Jan King told the jury, while Chase had agreed to robbing Brent Slaughter to get drugs, he didn't agree to robbing Mosely and "was not a part of the shooting or the armed robbery."

Mosely was killed shortly after midnight, in an apartment at 1029-B Buena Vista St., in a Jefferson City public housing complex.

Richardson said the story of Mosely's murder began on April 21, a Saturday, when Chase told his friend, Danielle Coleman, that he wanted to get some drugs.

Coleman testified Tuesday she had been involved indirectly in the drug transaction, telling a friend in Columbia that Chase wanted to get some drugs.

But she said she wasn't involved in the direct negotiations for the marijuana.

Coleman rented the apartment, and was living there with her two children and with Rachel Mitchell.

After an afternoon of people coming and going from her apartment, she said, she was sitting on a couch in the living room, shortly after midnight, when Chase came back into the apartment followed by two men.

She thought a masked man was Khiry Summers, but didn't know his last name.

Summers also is charged in the case, and his trial is scheduled for next month. A third defendant, Tracy Session, pleaded guilty last year and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Coleman told King that, when she saw the mask, she ran downstairs to her two children. She told Richardson she helped both children and Mitchell get out of the apartment's ground floor through a window.

But she stayed in the home and comforted Mosely after he was shot, Coleman testified.

Mitchell testified she had heard Chase talking with Session and Summers, but not what they were talking about. She also told Richardson she had not heard Chase tell anyone to get a gun.

If convicted of the second-degree murder charge, Chase could be sentenced to from 10 to 30 years in prison, or for life.

Conviction of the first-degree robbery charge also carries a possible 10-30 years, or life in prison, sentence.

And conviction of the armed criminal action charge would mean a minimum five-year sentence, separate from any other sentence.