CLEARLAKE, Calif. – The lead investigator in a fatal June 18 shooting took the stand on Wednesday as the preliminary for the three suspects in the case moved into its fourth day.
Kevin Ray Stone, 29, of Clearlake, and Paul William Braden, 21, and Orlando Joseph Lopez, 23, returned to Judge Stephen Hedstrom's Clearlake courtroom on Wednesday for the proceedings, during which District Attorney Don Anderson called Clearlake Police Det. Tom Clements to the stand.
Stone, Braden and Lopez are facing charges of murder, mayhem, numerous counts of attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon, and many special allegations for the June 18 shooting at a Lakeshore Drive apartment that killed 4-year-old Skyler Rapp; wounded his mother, Desiree Kirby; her boyfriend, Ross Sparks and his brother, Andrew Sparks; and friends Ian Griffith and Joseph Armijo.
Clements' testimony focused primarily on his interviews with Stone, Braden and Lopez, as well as evidence relating to the weapons allegedly used in the fatal shooting.
In previous testimony, Kirby, the Sparks brothers, their cousin Josh Gamble and Griffith – whose testimony finished Wednesday morning before Clements was called – all said they heard different kinds of gunfire, with Gamble stating he saw someone shooting a handgun.
While police received information that a handgun and a shotgun with the butt sawed off were used in the shooting, Clements said neither weapon was located.
The only evidence of that altered shotgun was what appeared to be a bolt sawed from a shotgun handle and a hacksaw with metal shavings in its teeth, which Clements said were recovered from the home of a Clearlake woman whose granddaughter dates Lopez's younger brother Leonardo.
Police did find a shotgun in the apartment of Stone's girlfriend, and a .22 rifle left under a motorhome in a yard along a route the men allegedly used to leave the scene of the shooting, Clements said.
Two types of ammunition – lead double ought buckshot and smaller steel duck shot – were used in the incident. Three spent shotgun shells were found at the scene and one unexpended shell was discovered in a van Stone allegedly crashed while fleeing, Clements said.
Clements said he first contacted Braden in the early morning hours of June 20, when he considered Braden a “person of interest” and not yet a suspect.
Clearlake Police had been in Middletown following up on leads on another suspect when a policy dispatcher received an anonymous tip that Braden was bragging about doing the shooting, according to Clements.
Clements said Braden was taken into custody on a parole hold and interviewed at the Clearlake Police Department, where he stated that on June 18 he had been at the 16th Avenue home of Leonardo Lopez's girlfriend and her grandmother.
Braden claimed he was picked up by his father that night at about 10 p.m., returning to his father's Clearlake Oaks home. Clements said Braden denied knowing Stone, and said he wasn't involved in any shooting.
While Braden insisted his father had given him a ride home on the night of June 18, his father, Richard Braden, said in a Sept. 21 interview that while he received a text from his son at about 10:56 p.m. that night, he didn't pick him up because he had taken medications and couldn't drive, Clements said.
Clements said he and fellow Clearlake Police Det. Tim Alvarado went to the Sonoma County Sheriff's Office early on the morning of July 1 to interview Stone, who had been arrested in Sonoma County.
Prior to beginning the interview, Clements said he advised Stone of his Miranda rights, and Stone said there were certain things he didn't want to talk to them about without an attorney present.
Stone's attorney, Komnith Moth, objected to Clements' testimony, arguing to the court that Stone had effectively asserted his right to have an attorney present during the interrogation.
Braden's attorney, Doug Rhoades, and Lopez's attorney, Stephen Carter, joined the objection, raising separate issues about the admissibility of the statements and how they would affect their clients.
The hearing, which had only at that point been convened for a little over an hour, recessed for an hour and 15 minutes while Hedstrom and the attorneys went to study the issues further.
After the research recess, Hedstrom said it wasn't clear whether Stone's Miranda rights had been violated. He said he wanted to hear the testimony, ultimately ruling that he would allow it and deal with the motion of its admissibility later, once he knew its content and context.
The hours before the shooting
Clements explained that Stone told him that on June 18 he got a call from Lopez and Braden asked for a ride to go pick up some drugs. When Stone picked them up at the 16th Avenue residence, he said both were wearing black.
Stone and girlfriend Leighann Painchaud picked the men up in a red van owned by a relative of Painchaud. They drove back to Painchaud's apartment on Old Highway 53, where Stone and Painchaud went inside while Braden and Lopez remained in vehicle, Clements said.
Clearlake Police officers later served a search warrant on Painchaud's apartment, where a Browning semiautomatic shotgun was found stashed in between mattresses in a bedroom, Clements said.
When Clements asked Stone about that shotgun and if he had taken it out of the apartment, Stone allegedly said he didn't, that it was inoperable and then made a spontaneous statement that if he took a gun out of the apartment it would have been a .22.
According to the account Stone gave Clements, Stone left the apartment, where Painchaud stayed, and went back to the van driving to a home near the police department.
Clements said at that point in the interview Stone said he didn't want to talk about that part without an attorney. Stone then allegedly made another spontaneous statement: “If I was there Paul Braden was doing the shooting. I would stand up all day and point at him.”
After the shooting, Stone had driven from the scene, crashing at a nearby intersection. Stone told Clements that if he crashed the van, “It was because of all the crazy s**t that happened.”
Clements said he interviewed Lopez twice, once on June 20 and the second time on June 28. Lopez was under arrest both times; he had been arrested and later released, only to be rearrested and charged in the case.
According to Clements, Lopez gave more than one account of what occurred June 18.
Lopez told Clements he and Braden were at the home on 16th Avenue when they called Stone asking for a ride. Stone and Painchaud came by, picked them up, and they drove back to Painchaud's apartment.
Stone left the two men in the vehicle and went into the apartment with Painchaud, only to emerge alone about five minutes later with what appeared to be a shotgun in his jacket, according to Lopez's statement to Clements.
With Lopez in the front passenger seat and Braden in the back seat, Stone – who Lopez said was drunk – was “driving crazy” on the way to the home of Ross Sparks, Lopez told Clements.
Stone parked the van by a house not far from the Clearlake Police Department, and Stone and Braden then allegedly got out of the van – one of them had a weapon, Lopez couldn't specify who – and headed off toward a home, according to Clements.
Lopez told Clements he remained in the vehicle and heard three to four shots before Stone and Braden came running back to the van, which Stone crashed a few blocks from the scene after taking off.
Lopez's other account of the events had him getting out of the van and going with Braden and Stone into the backyard of Curtis Eeds – Sparks' and Kirby's neighbor – with Braden allegedly armed with a shotgun with a sawed off handle.
Lopez told Clements that both Stone and Braden had shotguns, and alleged that Braden ran up to the fence that separated the properties and shot through an opening where boards were missing – where shooting victims have testified to seeing muzzle blasts – and also had shot over the fence.
“After the shots were fired they all ran back to the van,” Clements said.
Stone drove east on Lupoyoma Street, crashing the van into a tree and rock at the intersection with Koloko Street. After the crash, Lopez said he ran to the home of James Jordan – known as “Goofy,” who had been seen drinking beer and hanging out in Sparks' yard shortly before the shooting – and told Clements he hadn't seen Stone or Braden since that night.
In still another story, Lopez offered three versions of how a black pump shotgun was dropped off at the 16th Avenue home – by someone in a van, by a woman in a light green van and by an older man in a pickup said to be Braden's uncle, who he and Stone walked down 18th Avenue to meet.
Lopez told Braden sawed the butt off the shotgun and wrapped the pistol grip in duct tape before calling Stone for a ride, ending up at Eeds' home, with Braden shooting through the fence.
On the way from Painchaud's apartment to the shooting site, Lopez told Clements that Braden talked about wanting to shoot somebody and wanting to shoot up Ross Sparks' home. Lopez also said Braden had an argument with Sparks on Lopez's cell phone.
After the shooting, the three men escaped in the van, which Stone crashed, with Lopez telling Clements that he ran down Koloko Street to Woodland Drive, followed by Stone and Braden, until they ended up in Clearlake Park.
Lopez told Clements that Braden's mother drove from Clearlake Oaks to pick them up, but Braden's mother said she had picked them up a night earlier.
Clements said the .22 rifle police recovered in early July was found by a child underneath a motorhome at the corner of Koloko and Woodland, five blocks from Sparks' home. Clements said it was found on a route consistent with Lopez's story of the men running from the scene.
Testimony will resume at 8:15 a.m. Thursday.
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