COLUMBIA CITY – Jurors found David G. Hagan guilty of reckless homicide after nearly three hours of deliberation on the fourth day of Hagan’s trial Friday. The murder charge has been dropped with a not guilty verdict. The jury left the courtroom at 5 p.m., returning around 8:20 p.m. with their decision. Whitley County Prosecuting Attorney Matthew Rentschler said reckless homicide carries a sentence from one to six years. Hagan will be sentenced by Whitley County Circuit Court Judge James Heuer at 10:30 a.m. June 13. Hagan entered the witness box in his own defense on the fourth and last day of a trail. Hagan, 52, was charged with the murder and reckless homicide of Adam Porter, then 29, also of South Whitley, spoke after forensic consultant Barie Goetz. Under questioning from Hagan’s lawyer, Patrick Arata, Goetz said he traveled to Fort Wayne where Indiana State Police held the physical evidence in the case. He found blood and grass stains on the shirt and jeans Hagan wore the evening of Aug. 14, the night of the shooting. The blood pattern was as described by an expert brought in by the state as concentrated on the left side of the garments, mostly around and spreading from the side seam of the pants, from the waistband to the cuff, with some staining on the lower left side of the T-shirt. Goetz said they were caused by blood moving at high velocity and created by the gunshot to the back of Adam Porter’s head with Hagan’s .44 caliber Smith and Wesson magnum revolver. Goetz also found grass stains on the right shoulder of the T-shirt and right back side of the pants. He said the grass stains were the result of transfer with the grass and movement across the grass because of the parallel lines caused by folds. He said because of the barrel length of the gun, 8-1/2 inches, Porter’s head couldn’t be much further than 10-1/2 inches away from Hagan’s own head and closer to Hagan’s chest. He speculated Hagan was on his right side with his leg over Porter when the fatal shot was fired. He said because Hagan rinsed off his hands and forearms in the sink, there’s no evidence of the blood on Hagan’s hands. Under questioning from assistant prosecuting attorney DJ Sigler, Goetz said he did not visit the Hagan property and did not review any witness statements or grand jury transcripts but only police reports. He understood a portion of a bullet was found in the house siding 1 foot, 11 inches from the ground but he did not see the analysis. Sigler asked if Hagan could have shot while on his knees, and Goetz said the evidence wasn’t consistent with that. The jury was presented with several photographs of Goetz laying on his left side with tape white tape indicating where the blood stains were and orange tape marking grass stains. A white stick represented the gun and a stuffed plastic bag Porter’s head. Sigler asked if the gun could’ve been in Hagan’s left hand, and Goetz said no. He started with the gun in the left hand but positioning evolved to the gun being in the right hand because that fit the evidence. On redirect, Arata clarified that many photographs were taken to narrow down the position Hagan was in and Goetz said that was correct. To answer a juror’s question, Goetz said Porter’s position would have been on his stomach at the time of the shot then he would have been moved onto his back. In his testimony, Hagan described himself as 5 feet, 10 inches tall and weighing about 160 pounds on Aug. 14. He said he learned Porter and Linda Bower were trying to acquire Percocet from Vonda Kelsey a day or two after a Fourth of July barbecue. Kelsey, 61, is Hagan’s long-time girlfriend who has lived with him for 20 years. He said Bowers acted like she didn’t want to be at the cookout that day, that she was different than at other times. He thought it had to do with the variety of guests at the party. When he learned of Kelsey giving the pills to Bowers, he told Kelsey she shouldn’t do that and told her he didn’t want her to do it any more. It was his understanding Kelsey gave Bowers a total of four pills. Arata asked him where he worked and Hagan said at DePuy Orthopedics, Warsaw, as a model maker in research and development. He had worked on the manufacturing side of DePuy, too. He has worked in numerous machine shops since he was 18 years old and at DePuy the last 14-1/2 years. He graduated from Whitko High School in 1981 and has taken various courses in technology at IPFW. He talked about the day – July 31 or Aug. 1 – that Porter and Bowers came to the house. He said his bedroom has two windows to the front, or south, and side, to the west, with a panoramic view of the driveway. He thought it odd that Bowers came to the front, south-side door, and Porter went to the side, or west-side door. He was aware of disturbing burglaries in which two people approach both entrances into the house. With this in mind, he collected his gun, loaded it and stuck it into the waistband at the small of his back. Bowers knocked at the front and he answered the front door. Bowers asked if Kelsey was there. “Not asking normally, a bit more demanding,” he said. “I didn’t know where she was. I don’t require her to tell me where she’s gone. Sometimes she walks the dog. Sometimes she took a walk. Sometimes she visited neighbors. Bowers demanded to know where Vonda was and asked repeatedly. I said I didn’t know.” And all the time he kept half an ear toward the back of the house in case Porter tried to enter the house. Arata asked if he could see the side door from where he stood at the front door. Hagan said no, but there was a window on the side of the house and someone passing by could be seen. “I got fed up with being interrogated at my own door,” he said. “In the meantime, a neighbor’s cat snuck in the front door. I said she and Adam needed to get the F off my property and not to come back.” Arata asked if Bowers had her toe in the door. Hagan said she was holding the screen door open with her right and had her left on the door jamb. He said Porter had gone back to Bowers’ vehicle by then and heard him say not to come back. He said he didn’t slam the door but closed it firmly. He described the other handguns in the house as antiques. One is a .3220 grain pistol owned by his grandfather and another a .25 caliber gun. He said neither could withstand firing with modern ammunition and would probably explode if fired. He said the rifles in a closet are not loaded and all ammunition is kept separate from the guns. The .44 is the only functioning handgun in the house and he keeps it in his bedroom closet. The ammunition is in the bed’s headboard in a cubbyhole along with the speed loader, which holds six bullets. He said the speed loader will fill a cylinder in the time it takes to drop one bullet in a chamber. Hagan said the unexpected appearance became an attempted burglary in his mind. When he talked to Kelsey about it, she said she saw Bowers and Porter, too. He said the day of Aug. 14, he went to work and came home as usual around 4:30 or 4:45 p.m., changed out of his work clothes and went to the local carry-out around 5 p.m. He expected to stay home all evening. He poured a two-finger measure of vodka over ice in a 16-ounce mason jar and topped it off with tonic. He ordered dinner to go at the local hamburger stand and went after the meal around 6:20 p.m. and returned home. He fixed a second drink and had dinner. By 7:30 p.m. he had started a third drink and was watching the news. He was in the kitchen when, “I saw the person I’d ordered off my property.” Watching from the kitchen he saw Porter talking with Kelsey at the edge of the property line. Porter had a can of beer in his right hand and he was waving his arms in an agitated and animated manner. “I was concerned for her safety,” he said about Kelsey. “I made the decision to run him off. I went and got my gun. I went across the back yard to approach Adam. The gun was in my right hand, pointed down. I was halfway across the back yard and I said nothing. “Adam turned and charged. He hit hard, right in my chest. I lost my sandals and hit the ground. I flinched and the gun went off. It was aimed toward the river. Adam and I wrestled. I was pinned underneath him. He put his hand on my right forearm, not firmly. I was struggling.” Arata asked him if he was fearful. Hagan said he was afraid that if Porter got the handgun for himself he would use it on him or Kelsey. He thought the wrestling lasted two or three minutes. He said he was looking at the back of Porter’s head and that Porter was on top of him the whole time until he reached around and fired but he didn’t know where he was firing. “I was trying to scare him, thinking he might run away.” Arata asked Hagan what he meant to do in the back yard and Hagan said he was going to tell him to leave, again. “If he hadn’t attacked you, he would be alive?” Arata asked. Hagan said yes. “If he hadn’t put his hand on your gun arm, he would be alive?” Arata asked. “Yes, I believe so.” “Did you know he could be dangerous?” Arata asked. Hagan said he had a hyper-awareness of the danger Porter represented and had heard from friends about Porter’s dangerous behavior. Rentschler objected to this hearsay and Heuer agreed. Arata retired and Rentschler questioned Hagan, asking him to relate his exact position when he fired the fatal bullet. Hagan left the witness box and laid down on the floor in front of the jury on his right side with his left arm bent in front of him and his legs together and slightly bent. He held his head off the floor. He demonstrated his gun hand position bringing his right hand up and over his left shoulder, saying he fired from that position. Hagan returned to the witness stand and Rentschler asked him if he blamed Kelsey for creating his current situation. Hagan said he hadn’t thought about that. Rentschler asked if it wasn’t an incredibly stupid thing for Kelsey to do. Adam Porter was dead and he was sitting in a courtroom determining the rest of his life. Didn’t the couple have an agreement that there would be no further giving of pills, no contact at all with Porter and Bowers? Wasn’t Hagan upset about Kelsey’s contact with them? Hagan said in retrospect, yes, he was upset. Wasn’t he upset with her for inviting Porter into the back yard? Hagan said he was upset with her for doing that and, as he understood, Porter was already drunk and high. “Since Vonda has lived at 305 West Buckeye for 20 years, she had the right to invite people into the back yard,” Rentschler said. “She was smart enough to make her own friends, not pass pills, make her own decisions in her own back yard.” Hagan said yes. “And you don’t care who she’s friends with, but according to your Facebook posting, you don’t trust people unless you’ve known them longer than 10 years,” Rentschler said. Rentschler moved on to the attempted burglary when he saw Porter at the back door and Bowers at the front. He asked Hagan if he asked Bowers why Porter was at the side door and Hagan said no because Bowers kept repeating, “Where’s Vonda?” He was irritated when the cat came in. Rentschler asked Hagan if he ever addressed Porter about staying away. Hagan said Porter had returned to their vehicle and definitely heard him. Rentschler said in a Facebook posting dated Aug. 2 Hagan wrote about his girlfriend’s new friends, that he didn’t like or trust them and they just wanted pills. He stressed that he just wanted a vodka and tonic to unwind. Hagan said, “not to get drunk.” Rentschler said on the night of Aug. 14 Hagan had a .15 alcohol concentration equivalent, which is above the state legal limit. “Per state regulations,” Hagan said. “Is .15 drunk?” Rentschler asked. “Yes, I suppose so,” Hagan said. Rentschler returned to the Aug. 2 Facebook post, saying Hagan doesn’t describe telling Bowers or Porter or anyone not to come back but “‘they have no idea who they’re f’g dealing with,’ and that turned out to be true, didn’t it?” Hagan said he guessed it was. Rentschler wanted to know why Hagan didn’t call the police to report the attempted burglary. Hagan said he didn’t know it was a felony. “If I point a gun at someone and Mr. Sigler tackles me and I don’t shoot, it’s still an attempted murder,” Rentschler said. If you’d reported this, it would have been good information for the police to have. “One week before, with Danielle and Michelle over, Vonda talked about being hounded for pills. Did you say if Adam Porter ever comes here again, I’ll shoot him?” Hagan said no. Rentschler wondered why Michelle Wakefield would say that and why a neighbor, Lydia Hyden, would say Kelsey said the same thing. Hagan said he had no idea. Rentschler said if he had said it, it would show an intention that he hoped to kill Porter or hope he would give Porter an excuse to kill him. Hagan didn’t reply to this. “Did Vonda tell you Adam Porter had called her that day?” Rentschler asked. Hagan said she did not. He asked if Hagan saw Bowers’ son with Porter, and Hagan said no because the TV, where he was watching the news, sat across from the windows. Rentschler asked Hagan how long he contemplated loading his gun and asking Porter to leave the property. Hagan said three to four seconds. He asked what kind of ammunition was in the gun. Hagan said four bullets, a home defense brand with a safety slug used in case a gun is fired and misses. The bullet wouldn’t travel through the shooter’s home and into the neighbor’s, but would implode in the nearest wall. Hagan used two hollow point bullets to fill the gaps in the cylinder. Rentschler asked Hagan why he thought Porter was an imminent threat to Kelsey, because Kelsey said nothing about aggression, nothing about flailing arms. He wondered why Hagan didn’t call the police. Maybe Hagan made a mistake in judgment, that there was no threat to Kelsey and that’s why he didn’t call the police. Rentschler speculated Hagan didn’t believe alcohol interfered with his judgment. “In this case,” Hagan said, “I’d have done the same thing sober.” Rentschler asked if, in hindsight, Hagan wished he’d called the police because he had no problems reporting someone riding a four-wheeler in the park in 2008; someone riding a dirt bike on Buckeye Street in 2010; and complained about fireworks after 11 p.m. on another occasion. “Each time a police officer arrived and took care of the situation,” Rentschler said. “You knew how to do it. “Why not yell at Adam and tell him to go and not come back? Call the police? or say, ‘Adam, get the hell out of here!’ or, ‘Vonda, get your butt in the house!’? “You didn’t know Adam Porter was a heroin addict, a pill taker or drinking.” Hagan said he had a beer can. Rentschler said OK, but Hagan didn’t know how many beers he had. Rentschler asked Hagan if he would have driven his car after drinking the amounts he did, and Hagan said no. “You felt comfortable handling a .44 magnum gun but not behind the wheel of your Mustang? But you behind a weapon is different?” Rentschler asked. Hagan said whether his alcohol levels were .15 or .000 he would have made the same decision. “I’m OK with myself on my property,” he said. Rentschler said he disregarded the harm that might result by walking into that back yard. He asked Hagan if he was a marijuana user and Hagan said yes, occasionally. He asked Hagan if he used the firearm accountably on Aug. 14, and Hagan said he believed so. Arata returned to his client and asked if Hagan knew Porter had a history of violence when intoxicated. The state objected to this line of speculation. Hagan said he was concerned for his girlfriend, that she was an older woman and he had told Porter and Bowers not to return and they violated his orders. He thought Porter was animated. “My first thought was, ‘He’s about to lay into her,’” Hagan said. He said he thought the police would take seven minutes or longer to arrive. Arata asked if the police could have arrested Kelsey for giving away her pills, and Hagan said he was sure they could have. Hagan said Porter was to blame because he was told two weeks ago not to come back, that it turns out he was highly intoxicated and on drugs and he inflicted that on himself. “My intent was to tell Porter to get off my property,” Hagan said. “He charged into me, slammed me into the ground. He was on top, I was pinned, wrestling, trying to extract myself.” Arata asked Hagan if he thought Porter attacked him because he was older. “No,” Hagan said. “I thought that would be a deterrent.” He said he left the gun by Porter’s body because it seemed sensible at the time, not to move anything, to leave things where they were. Arata asked Hagan why he put bullets in the gun if his intention was to scare Porter off the property. Hagan said without bullets the gun was just a club. Hagan was excused and the defense called Robert John Delloty to the stand. Delloty went over the same material state’s witness Shirley Arnold covered in her toxicology report regarding levels of drunkenness, drug effects and combining alcohol and narcotics. Following the lawyer’s closing statements, the jury began their deliberations at 5 p.m.
