Federal drug trafficking trial set to begin for murder defendant Jervoris Scarbrough
By Brendan Kirby
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MOBILE, Alabama (WALA) — A man charged with murder is set to go on trial Monday on federal drug charges.
Mobile police arrested Jervoris Durmaine Scarbrough last year on charges stemming from the 2014 shooting death of David Patrick Kyles. He was the first person prosecutors tried to lock up without bail under Aniah’s Law, which gives judges greater discretion to deny bond. A judge initially denied the prosecution request but later revoked the 39-year-old Mobile man’s bond after finding the defendant failed to obey a house arrest order.
Scarbrough is one of 14 people named in an indictment alleging a massive conspiracy to sell marijuana smuggled in suitcases on commercial flights between California and the Mobile area. One defendant died. Of the rest, all but Scarbrough have pleaded guilty.
The reputed head of the organization, Demario King, admitted last year that he was responsible for up to 700 kilograms of marijuana and that his bank records reflected more than $1 million in unexplained income.
Prosecutors already have publicly detailed much of the evidence against Scarbrough in related court filings. Those court records detail cash seizures they maintain agents made during the investigation:
Feb. 11, 2020, at the Houston airport. A trained drug-sniffing dog alerted to the odor of marijuana and cash. Agents seized $15,000 from Scarbrough and two unindicted co-conspirators who were traveling from Sacramento to Mobile.
March 31, 2021, at Pensacola International Airport. Agents stopped Reneshia Spencer and seized 48 pounds of marijuana from her checked luggage. Investigators also found communications between her cell phone and Scarbrough, whom she previously had met in Sacramento, according to court records. Spencer pleaded guilty last year to conspiracy to distribute marijuana, and a judge sentenced her to probation.
Dec. 28, 2021, in Georgia’s Coweta County. According to a prosecution filing, law enforcement officers stopped Scarbrough, who was driving from Mobile. He had $8,000 in bulk cash and gave an inconsistent story explaining his travel, according to the court document.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office in a court filing last week offered a window into how prosecutors intend to prove the case. That court filing indicates that prosecutors may call law enforcement officers to offer “opinion testimony” about the methods and operation of drug trafficking organizations. Prosecutors also plan to introduce evidence extracted from the cell phones of some of Scarbrough’s co-conspirators and “excited utterances” that co-conspirators made to law enforcement investigators during the interdiction of bulk cash transfers.
According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, the prosecution case is expected to take all week. As for Scarbrough’s murder case, Mobile County prosecutors have yet to present it to a grand jury.
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