Day two of the Rafael Aikens murder trial continued Tuesday in Joshua Tree Superior Court. Aikens is accused of shooting and killing 62-year-old Renee Metcalf and her 32-year-old daughter, Christy McKissic in Twentynine Palms in March 2017. Managing editor Tami Roleff was in the courtroom, and says jurors heard about bullet trajectories and other evidence…
Christy McKissic was shot twice in her head while the shooter was above her in her bed. So testified Sheriff’s sergeant Marc Goodwin, who was the case agent—also known as the team leader—of the investigation into the murders of Renee Metcalf and Christy McKissic.
One of the shots is believed to have gone through McKissic’s head, through the mattress, until lodging in the carpet on the floor.
Yesterday McKissic’s young daughter testified that McKissic’s mother, Renee Metcalf, heard the shots and ran out of her bedroom to check on McKissic. Metcalf was shot three times; Goodwin said that bullet trajectories showed that the shooter was in the middle of McKissic’s bed when Metcalf was shot in her left calf and her back. She fell to the floor and was halfway in the bedroom and halfway in the hall. Goodwin said the third shot was to Metcalf’s head and the shooter had gotten out of bed for the final shot.
In addition, there were two other shots fired that went through the bedroom walls and door and ended up in the hallway.
Deputies only collected one bullet casing from the scene, although house cleaners found two others later. The bullet casing was a Win 45 auto+P, which means it was a .45 caliber bullet made by Winchester.
Detectives found at least two partial bullet fragments, one in the blood pool near Metcalf’s body, and one caught in the hair in the back of McKissic’s head.
Other evidence collected was a partial torn condom wrapper that was on top of the pool of blood surrounding Metcalf’s head in the hallway. There were no blood spatters on the top of the wrapper. The rest of the condom wrapper and the condom were never found.
Goodwin testified that investigators found evidence that seven shots were fired in the house; the magazine of the murder weapon–a 1911 Rock Island .45 caliber pistol—hold seven bullets.
There was a lot of discussion by defense attorney Donald Calabria concerning a mention of a “bloody footprint” in the investigators’ report. Eventually Goodwin stated that there was a bloody footprint in the hall near Metcalf but there were no ridges in the print and nothing the investigators could use to identify either the type or shoe, shoe size, or any other identifying characteristics about the shoe or the print.
Calabria also pointed out that investigators did not collect evidence to prove that tire tracks outside the home belonged to the Toyota 4Runner that investigators say Aikens borrowed and drove to the home that night. On Monday, an unidentified Marine and Thomas Milbachler, a good friend of Aikens said they went out drinking with two other friends in Yucca Valley. Milbachler was dropped off at his barracks while Aikens and the other Marine went to park the 4Runner. Milbachler said he woke up the next day to find his keys in his room, but he doesn’t know when they were put there, or who returned them.
Calabria also focused on Rafael Aikens’ height of 5 feet, 8 inches tall. On Monday, McKissic’s daughter described the assailant—whom she said she didn’t know—as a black man, with skin darker than hers (she is bi-racial) and tall, like a basketball player.
Prosecutor Justin Crocker introduced into evidence the murder weapon, a .45-caliber 1911 Rock Island pistol; the bullet fragment found in McKissic’s hair; and the shell casing found on a table in McKissic’s bedroom, as well as photos of Aikens the day he was arrested for the murder showing him with short hair on the sides and curly hair on top of his head.
