A Caddo Parish jury on Tuesday, November 21, 2017, found Quindarius Deshun Allen guilty of the October 13, 2014, slaying of Gregory Morris, 34, in a west-central Shreveport motel room, and of trying to kill a female companion of Morris’s.
Morris was killed and his friend grievously wounded when a man showed up at their west-central Shreveport motel and started firing a weapon. Allen, 21, of Shreveport, was arrested by Shreveport police in connection with that attack in the 2600 block of Claiborne Avenue.
The jury deliberated two hours before returning to District Judge John D. Mosely Jr.’s courtroom with its verdicts.
During the trial jurors heard from a friend of Allen’s, who testified Allen stated he planned to rob Morris. Jurors also heard from a ballistics expert who testified that the ammunition recovered had all been cycled by the same weapon, and that an unfired shotgun shell recovered from Allen’s vehicle matched both a fired and unfired round found at the murder scene.
The jury heard a two-hour statement from Allen, where he admitted being at the scene and buying drugs, but denied killing Morris.
The woman wounded in the attack also testified and showed her catastrophic injuries to the jury. Allen shot her in both legs, resulting in 20 surgeries to date, with many more needed in the future.
Allen faces a mandatory sentence of life at hard labor in prison, without possibility of probation, parole or suspension of sentence for the second-degree murder conviction. He faces up to 20 additional years at hard labor for the attempted manslaughter conviction. Formal sentencing has been set for December 18, 2017.
Prosecutors for the state were assistant district attorneys Bill Edwards and Britney A. Green. Allen was defended by Michelle Andrepont and Michael Enright.