DONIPHAN - The state’s key witness in a Ripley County murder case testified Tuesday that she was too scared to look, but could hear sounds of a man being beaten in the back seat of the car in which she was a front-seat passenger.
Schylar A. Tubbs, 25, testified in Ripley County Circuit Court during the first of five preliminary hearings scheduled Tuesday for the defendants charged with the July 21 murder of 44-year-old Daniel Lee Richardson.
Four of those defendants - including Tubbs, Cody A. Payne, David B. Schrivner Jr. and Dawn A. Lloyd - waived their rights to a preliminary hearing and were bound over for trial.
Tubbs was called by prosecutor Edward W. Thompson to testify during the hearing for Jared L. Lloyd, Dawn Lloyd’s husband.
Tubbs’ testimony came after Thompson called to the witness stand Cpl. David Patton, an investigator for the Missouri State Highway Patrol, forensic pathologist Dr. Russell Deidiker and three others.
Diediker said he was able to identify Richardson’s badly burned body through dental records and a tattoo. Investigators found the remains July 27 in a burned vacant house on County Road 21N-18, about 10 miles north of Doniphan.
Diediker testified carbon monoxide tests conducted on tissue during the autopsy indicated Richardson was “deceased prior to being burned.”
During questioning by the prosecutor, Tubbs said she rode with the others from Doniphan during the early morning hours of July 21 to Rick’s 66, a 24-hour convenience store in south Poplar Bluff.
“I was just hanging out with them. We went to the gas station and were looking for Danny Richardson,” Tubbs said.
“Why?” the prosecutor asked.
“He threw Marcie (High) out of a vehicle,” Tubbs said.
Richardson reportedly was to be released from the Butler County Jail following a 24-hour hold for allegedly assaulting High the previous evening while the two drove on U.S. Highway 160 at Fairdealing in Ripley County.
Tubbs said she was aware that Richardson and High had been in a relationship and that Jerad Lloyd was High’s brother.
She said they made contact with Danny Richardson at the gas station.
“We were going to get him high,” said Tubbs.
Tubbs said after they got inside the car, the Lloyds and Cody Payne also got into the back seat with Richardson. She and Scrivner were in the vehicle’s two front bucket seats.
“Did he scream for help?” Thompson asked.
“Yes,” Tubbs said.
Tubbs said Scrivner drove to a gravel road but she wasn’t sure of the location. Tubbs said Scrivner moved from the driver’s seat to the back while Dawn Lloyd moved to the driver’s seat.
“What happened inside the car?” Thompson asked.
“All I remember is being scared,” she said. “I heard choking and I heard gurgling and I heard him scream for help. I wished I could have stopped it but I was scared.”
Tubbs said the beating continued while the group drove for “35-40 minutes” to the home of Derek Bunyard on Highway K north of Doniphan. Scrivner also was living there, she said.
Tubbs said Richardson remained in the car while the others got out.
“I heard someone say he was dead,” she said.
Tubbs said she was told by Dawn Lloyd to remove her clothes so they could be burned.
Thompson asked if she had witnessed the body being placed in a cardboard barrel. Tubbs said “no” but “that’s what someone told me.”
Tubbs said she saw the barrel on the front porch and it stayed there until the following night, when it was hauled away by Payne, Scrivner and Jerad Lloyd in a “camouflaged” color pickup.
The court also reviewed surveillance video taken by several cameras inside and outside Rick’s 66 convenience store in Poplar Bluff after 1 a.m. July 21.
Patton said the videos show the Lloyds and Payne waiting behind the building while Tubbs, Scrivner and Richardson walked outside the store and got inside the vehicle.
Patton stated around 1:42 a.m. the video shows the three others walking from behind the building and getting inside the car. He said the videos showed Richardson trying to get out of the vehicle as it pulled away.
Associate Circuit Judge Thomas D. Swindle ruled no probable cause exists on charges against Jared Lloyd of first-degree murder armed criminal action, first-degree arson and tampering with evidence. He was bound over to face trial on charges of kidnapping, second-degree murder and abandonement of a corpse.
A charge of first-degree murder against Dawn Lloyd also was dismissed at the prosecutor’s request on Tuesday. She was bound over to face trial on charges of second-degree murder, kidnapping and abandonement of a corpse.
Scrivner, Payne and Tubbs all were bound over for trial on original charges of first-degree murder, kidnapping, second-degree arson, tampering with evidence, second-degree murder, first-degree assault and abandonement of a corpse.
All five remain in jail without bond.
A sixth man originally charged in the case - Derek Bunyard - appeared Sept. 10 for a preliminary hearing and was bound over on felony charges of tampering with physical evidence and abandonement of a corpse. Charges of first-degree murder, kidnapping and arson were dismissed. He is set to appear in court for trial setting on Jan. 6.