A fatal stabbing apparently motivated by road rage might actually have been premeditated, according to evidence disclosed Friday during a pretrial hearing for Michael Razzio Simmons.
The Fallston man is charged with murder in Bel Air?s first homicide case in almost 25 years. He is accused of stabbing to death Patrick Walker, 23, in an alley near the Harford County courthouse in May. Police said the two men didn?t know each other before the confrontation.
Bel Air Det. Edward Smith testified Friday that when investigators searched Simmons? home for evidence after the incident, with Simmons in custody already, they found a printout of an Internet chat describing a situation that “sounded ominous.”
Although the chat had been printed out before the incident occurred, “it sounded similar to the assault on Patrick Walker,” Smith said.
Assistant State?s Attorney Vernon Gentile said the chat showed Simmons? mindset prior to the incident. “The words in this note talk about killing somebody, where they?re bleeding to death,” he said.
Simmons? defense attorney, David Henninger, asked the judge not to allow that evidence to be used at trial because police had a warrant to search his client?s room for a receipt for the knife allegedly used in the attack, which they did not find. Henninger said the warrant only included the receipt so the printout should be inadmissible.
Henninger also argued Friday that the court should not allow Simmons? statements to police to be admitted as evidence.
In a taped interview, detectives read him his Miranda rights, and Simmons acknowledged that he understood them. But police did not have him formally sign a written form acknowledging that he understood the rights he was waiving, Henninger said.
“Juveniles and teenagers need their rights to be understood,” Henninger said. “That form spells it all out, one at a time.”
Simmons was 19 at the time.
Led into the courtroom and left in shackles, Simmons said in hindsight he would have called a lawyer before talking to the detectives.
