Maryland?s second-highest court Thursday refused to overturn the 2004 murder conviction of a Columbia man accused of killing his 2-year-old stepson, though one of the jurors was a Nigerian citizen.
Maryland law states that jurors must be eligible to vote, which requires U.S. citizenship.
But one of the 12 people on the Howard County Circuit Court jury that convicted Marcus Dannon Owens, 35, was not a U.S. citizen.
Even so, Maryland Court of Special Appeals Judge Ellen L. Hollander wrote Thursday that a Howard County Circuit Court decision to refuse a retrial for Owens was “well reasoned.”
Owens was convicted of second-degree depraved heart murder, first-degree assault and child abuse. Depraved heart murder is a murder resulting from an act so reckless that it demonstrates the person?s lack of regard for human life.
Police charged Owens after receiving a July 30, 2003, call from Howard County General Hospital doctors, who reported that the death of a 2-year-old child appeared suspicious.
A doctor who testified in Owens? trial said the child?s “massive injuries” were akin to “someone that fell off a building.”
Owens was the only adult around the child in the hours before his death, police said.
After the jury returned the guilty verdict, a Nigerian juror expressed concern that he was not an American citizen ? causing Owens to ask for a retrial.
In her decision denying that motion, Howard County judge Diane O. Leasure wrote that the was “no evidence” to suggest that the Nigerian juror denied Owens a fair trial.
