Teenager cleared of transvestite?s slaying

But a Baltimore City jury disagreed Thursday ? and acquitted Zukael Stephens of all counts.

“This was not a stupid Baltimore City jury,” said Stephens? attorney, Linwood Hedgepeth. “What would you believe: What a prosecutor says or your own eyes? The jury believed their own eyes.”

Much of the trial seemed to center on a surveillance video that police said showed Stephens hurrying from the building on the 1000 block of St. Paul Street at 10:49 p.m. on Oct. 11, 2006. A call for a fire in which Marcus Rogers, a cross-dresser, was injured inside the apartment came at 10:51 p.m. Suffering from a fractured skull, burns on his back and cuts on his face, Rogers died six days later at Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center.

Hedgepeth said he was able to show the jury that the man rushing from the apartment was not Stephens.

“The defendant has got a prominent nose, and it is not there in the video,” he said. “The police started out with the theory that Stephens picked up Rogers, who was dressed as a woman, found out he was a man and killed him. But Mr. Stephens had known Mr. Rogers for years. The state never presented a motive, and the picture showed it was absolutely not him.”

The jury?s decision had prosecutors scratching their heads, however.

“Prosecutors presented a very strong case including surveillance video that placed the defendant and victim together at the crime scene moments before the murder as well as DNA and forensics evidence that made what we thought was a compelling case for the state,” said Joseph Sviatko, a spokesman for the Baltimore City State?s Attorney?s Office.

Upon arrest, Stephens admitted to knowing the victim and being at the victim?s apartment before the fire, but Stephens said he and Rogers were in the apartment with two males.

Shortly after his arrest, prosecutors accidentally dropped murder charges against Stephens ? and had to recharge the case.

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