A Baldwin County woman who has admitted to participating in a plot to take out a man in Louisiana testified Monday that she made three trips last year but never went through with it.
Rebecca Murphy testified that her neighbor in Baldwin County east of Fairhope, Mitzy Gaye Smith, recruited her last year to kill a man named Raul Mina. At the time, he was involved in a nasty custody battle with his estranged wife, whose mother is Smith’s sister.
That sister, Sandra Grimes, pleaded guilty in October, leaving Smith and sister Judy Owen to face the jury. , who was Murphy’s partner at the time of the conspiracy, pleaded guilty Monday to participating in the conspiracy and giving Murphy ammunition.in September to conspiracy to commit murder for hire, testified that the women discussed various ways the murder could be carried out – from injecting him with heroin to shooting him to running him over with a car.Attorneys for Smith and Owen sought to undermine Murphy’s credibility. “She’s a drug addict and a drug dealer,” defense attorney Dom Soto said during his open statement on behalf of Smith. Barre Dumas, who represents Owen, told jurors during his open statement that the prosecution’s case is built on “snitches” and “tale-bearers,” people who come up with a tale to tell. “No one was hurt in this thing. … No efforts were made,” he said. “No guns were fired. No syringes were filled with heroin. No knives were brandished.” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Terrill said during her opening statement that the evidence in the case is “voluminous” and told jurors they would not have to simply take Murphy’s word for it because receipts, text messages, phone records and other documents corroborate her account. She said the plot dates back as far as 2023 when, she told jurors, the sisters first hired a man to carry out the hit. But that man left with the money and a burner phone, Terrill said. “At its core, this case boils down to a group of women who had one goal in mind,” she said. “That goal, the purposes of which you’ll hear about, was to have a man killed.” Murphy testified that Owen gave her $200 to pay a veterinary bill so she could get her dog home. She said that was supposed to be part of her compensation for killing Mina. She said she suggested $5,000 for the rest of it, a figure she told jurors she “threw out there.” She testified that Owen gave her $300 to buy heroin that could be used to cause Mina to overdose, and on another occasion, Smith gave her a .22-caliber gun. Prosecutors showed that weapon to the jury. Murphy said she went with Owen to Marrero, Louisiana, near New Orleans, in February last year in order to become acquainted with where Mina lived and why he needed to die. She testified that she heard horrible things during that trip that Mina supposedly had done. A few weeks later, Murphy testified, she returned to Louisiana and waited outside of a courthouse where a custody hearing was taking place. But she testified that she told Owen she did not want to kill him outside of the courthouse.“She was cussing me, cussing me because I wasn’t doing anything,” she said. Murphy testified that she made a third trip to Louisiana in March, this time with Montgomery. She testified that when she returned without following through with the killing, Owen grew even more impatient. “She wanted some production for her money, to get off my lazy ass and do what she hired me to do,” she said.Most Read
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