Jamie & Gladys Scott

Scott County, Mississippi
Date of Alleged Crime:  December 24, 1993

Jamie and Gladys Scott, sisters, were convicted of participating with three teenage boys in the armed robbery of Johnny Ray Hayes and Mitchell Duckworth. The convictions were based on the testimony of the victims and two of the male robbers even though both groups initially gave police statements that made no mention of the sisters' involvement. The sisters were sentenced to life imprisonment.

At trial Hayes's testimony was as follows: He and his cousin, Duckworth, worked at McCarty Feed Mill in Forest. After leaving work at 10:30-11 p.m. they went to a nearby Mini Mart where they bought beer and cigarettes. While there Hayes saw Jamie, 22, and Gladys, 19, arrive as passengers in a blue Oldsmobile. Gladys asked them for a ride to her home at the Oakdale Apartments, also in Forest. After getting a ride to Gladys's home, Hayes and Duckworth drove the Scott sisters to Hillsboro where the sisters stopped to use a restroom at the back of a closed club called The Cow Pasture. Following the restroom stop, Gladys asked to drive Hayes' car, which Hayes allowed. Hayes said he had no previous acquaintance with the Scott sisters other than giving them a lift months before. A defense attorney suggested Hayes allowed Gladys to drive because he was becoming too drunk to drive. Duckworth was not legally permitted to drive as he had three DUI convictions.

Gladys then drove with the others to a house across the road where she and Jamie got out to talk to another person (or people) sitting in a blue Oldsmobile. The sisters then returned to the car. After leaving the area, Jamie, in the back seat with Duckworth, stated she was sick in her stomach, which caused Hayes to ask Gladys to stop the car because he did not want Jamie throwing up in his car. After stopping, a car pulled up behind them and a “guy” or “dude” wielding a shotgun robbed him and Duckworth. Hayes' testimony indicated at least one other person participated in the robbery. Hayes reported he was robbed of “about 200 something dollars.” The Scott sisters then left with the robbers in their car which Hayes identified as a blue Oldsmobile, presumably the same one that the sisters got out of at the Mini Mart and also visited across from the Cow Pasture.

Duckworth's testimony, though shorter, basically agreed with Hayes. In regard to the robbery, he said, “by the time Jamie got out, a twelve gauge shotgun come in, in the back of the car.” He said that he only saw two robbers and that a robber with a gun and a robber without a gun together robbed Hayes before coming to him and together robbing him. He also said a third person must have been involved because the “car couldn't drive by itself,” suggesting he saw the car move while the two robbers were outside of it. However, he did not mention a third person in his initial police report. In regard to how much he was robbed, he stated, “I didn't have much money in my wallet. Really, nothing, probably.”

Another witness, Howard Patrick, age 14, then testified in exchange for a plea deal. He said that the robbers were himself, his brother, Christopher Patrick, 16, and his cousin, Gregory Patrick, 18. Howard had signed a police statement that said Gladys had gotten into Hayes' car at the Oakdale Apartments rather than at the Mini Mart. When questioned about this discrepancy, Howard said he signed the statement without even reading it. When asked why he would do such a thing, he said that police threatened to send him to Parchman, an adult prison, where he would be raped. Howard testified that across from the Cow Pasture Gladys had talked to him and the other Patricks and told them to rob the dudes who were in the car after she stopped it down the road. He said that during the robbery Christopher held a shotgun on the victims while he robbed one victim and Gregory robbed the other. This account was unexplainably different from how Duckworth described the robbery. Howard said that Jaime split up the proceeds of the robbery and that he received between nine and eleven dollars.

Gregory Patrick also testified in exchange for a plea deal. He stated Hayes' car stopped on the road because Jamie and the guy in the back seat (Duckworth) were fighting and that he and the other Patricks got out to see what the fight was about. During Gregory's testimony, a handwritten statement, purportedly by him, was brought into evidence. This statement said Jamie was driving Hayes' car, not Gladys. Gregory however noted that the page this statement was on was not in his handwriting and that he did not sign the page. Gregory's signed statement did not say anything about the Patricks riding with the Scotts before or after the robbery, nor did it indicate the Scotts had anything to do with the robbery. The statement indicated that Christopher Patrick, the driver, got out of the car to talk with the guys about trying to touch Jamie. Gregory's trial testimony did not explain when the alleged robbery occurred or how the sisters could be involved.

Prior to trial the defense complained that the state refused to provide it with their criminal histories of its witnesses. The judge however allowed the trial to proceed with this withholding of evidence by the prosecution.

For purposes of determining guilt, the testimony of Howard Patrick can be disregarded in its entirety. Howard would be a questionable witness in any case due to his 14-year-old age. Having complained about being threatened with rape, it is clear his testimony was not voluntary. Since Duckworth was an alleged crime victim, one must presume his account of the robbery is correct and that Howard most likely perjured himself in supporting the prosecution view that all three Patricks were directly involved in the robbery.

When Hayes and Duckworth initially reported the crime on the day following its occurrence, the police write-ups of what they said fail to mention that the Scott sisters had gotten out of the robbers' car at the Mini Mart or that the sisters had gotten into the robbers' car following the robbery. Hayes and Duckworth had time to sober up and reflect on the crime and one would think that if the crime occurred in the manner they testified, they would be angry at the sisters for setting them up. Perhaps the two sheriff's deputies who took down their statements deliberately excluded the involvement of the sisters, but the presumption is they would have included it. Thus there is reasonable doubt that the sisters were involved. Gregory Patrick wrote and signed a statement a week after the crime which also contained no mention of the sisters riding with the Patricks before or after the robbery. There was also no evidence that Howard initially made any mention of this alleged fact either.

Gregory gave additional support to the sisters' defense by contradicting Hayes' and Duckworth's testimony in indicating that Hayes' car stopped because Duckworth and Jaime Scott were fighting in the back seat, rather than because of a ruse Jaime gave that she was sick in her stomach. From the evidence presented at trial, Gregory's view is more credible because it was contained in his initial statement. It also appears unlikely that the Scott sisters would participate in the armed robbery of victims who the sisters knew could identify them and who had been to Gladys's residence. Both of the Scott sisters were sentenced to life in prison.  [5/10]

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References:  Trial Transcript, Website

Posted in:  Victims of the State, Mississippi Cases