OAKLAND — Five weeks after the start of his trial, a 34-year-old local resident has avoided a murder conviction, at least for now.
Jurors were unable to agree on a verdict on the murder charge against Elijah Rucker, an Oakland resident whose attorney argued that witnesses who identified Rucker as the shooter were simply repeating a false rumor started at the crime scene. Rucker was accused of killing 34-year-old Romell Wright over a debt.
The jury convicted Rucker of illegally possessing a firearm found in his possession weeks after Wright was killed. But they acquitted him of an assault charge that alleged Rucker shot at Wright’s brother moments after the homicide.
Wright was shot and killed around 8 a.m. on Jan. 7, on the 1700 block of 89th Avenue in Oakland. He and others had spent the prior night crowded into a tiny sedan, using drugs, when prosecutors claim that Rucker showed up and confronted Wright about an outstanding debt, then shot him.
Wright allegedly claimed there were kids in the car, and when the gunman realized that was a lie, he shot Wright in the head, authorities said. Rucker was arrested five months after the homicide, and his trial started last December, a lightning pace for a murder case.
The case against Rucker appeared solid on paper; multiple eyewitnesses identified him as the shooter, despite their reluctance to aid police. But Rucker’s lawyer argued that this was the result of “gossip” that began to circulate after a crowd of people gathered at the crime scene.
Wright’s fiancée began circulating the name “Eli,” which was Rucker’s nickname, even though she hadn’t witnessed the shooting. One of the eyewitnesses overheard her, decided Rucker was responsible, and began repeating the rumor to others, tainting the witness pool, the defense argued at trial.
Jurors reviewed key eyewitness testimony several times before declaring they couldn’t agree on the murder count, according to notes submitted to the court during deliberations.
A new trial date has not yet been set. Rucker remains jailed while the prosecution and defense figure out what to do next.