2018 | State v. Albert Byrd

Defense attorneys for Albert D. Byrd IV successfully argued that they were "ambushed" during Byrd's November 2018 murder trial.

A woman who was an alleged eyewitness to the August 2018 altercation in which Byrd was accused of fatally stabbing Jermaine Donlow Jr. offered few details to Youngstown police officers when they first interviewed her. But she gave a more detailed account during her trial testimony, offering details that defense attorneys said prosecutors did not share with them beforehand, breaking with criminal trial procedure.

According to evidentiary reports and testimony provided by the prosecutor's office, Byrd, then 24, was visiting with Louanne Johnson at her Tyrell Avenue apartment and began fighting with Donlow just outside the apartment. Johnson, Donlow's former girlfriend, claimed she was being harassed by Donlow and that Byrd had armed himself with a knife before confronting Donlow.

Their melee spilled back into Johnson's apartment, and Johnson fled. She testified at trial that Byrd later exited the apartment with blood on his clothes and told her he had stabbed Donlow, according to Vindicator archives. Byrd's attorneys claimed he acted in self-defense.

A woman who lived in the apartment neighboring Johnson told Youngstown police she witnessed the fight, but that she could only see the vague shapes of two people through the peephole in her front door, and that she couldn't identify them.

But at trial, that neighbor expanded her testimony, instead saying there were actually three people fighting. She also identified the victim Donlow as being on the ground beneath the two others, who were beating him.

Though Johnson testified she believed Donlow had a gun and was preparing to draw it during the fight, her neighbor's testimony suggested Byrd was the one with the gun. The neighbor said she heard Byrd verbally threaten to shoot Donlow. It was another element of the woman's account that she didn't initially share with police and which wasn't disclosed to Byrd's defense before trial.

"It was a total surprise to me as well," former assistant Mahoning County prosecutor Dawn Cantalamessa told the court, according to a transcript. "No one here knew that she was going to be able to ID him, but she obviously could. And so we did it."

Former assistant Mahoning County prosecutor Dawn Cantalamessa (Source: Mahoning County Court Reporter's Office)

Cantalamessa last week told Mahoning Matters she discussed the facts of the neighbor's account with her for the first time just before trial. Since it was the first time Cantalamessa heard the woman's account, she said she was unaware that it differed from what she initially told police.

The court later determined that prosecutors did know ahead of time that the neighbor would give a more detailed account on the witness stand. Also, a Youngstown detective testified during trial that he had previously characterized the neighbor as "a liar."

Byrd's attorney Anthony Meranto of Boardman argued that it was a "trial by ambush."

"I want [the neighbor] examined and maybe investigated by the detectives of YPD because something is really rotten here," Meranto told the court. "This young man's not supposed to be facing that kind of fire. You want to do it fair? I'm all fair with everybody in this town. This is ridiculous. I've never had this experience before since the days of Paul Brown when there were three mistrials because all the sudden we're finding new evidence during every trial.

"This is ridiculous. It's blatant. And they need to be sanctioned for it right now, or we need to start it all over."

Meranto argued he could have prepared Byrd's defense differently had he known in advance that the neighbor would testify three people were involved in the fight, or that she heard Byrd threaten to shoot Donlow.

"One fact can change an entire strategy of a defense. And for that matter, a prosecution," Judge Anthony D'Apolito told the attorneys, according to a transcript.

Judge D'Apolito ordered the neighbor's testimony be stricken from the record and instructed Byrd's jury to disregard her statements.

Byrd was ultimately acquitted.

"He was found 'not guilty.' What are we going to do?" Cantalamessa said last week, when asked for her thoughts on the outcome. "He argued self defense and he prevailed. Whether or not [the neighbor's] testimony would have helped or hurt, we have no idea.

"We let the jury decide it."

This story was originally published October 26, 2021 at 3:52 AM with the headline "2018 | State v. Albert Byrd."