Key witness in murder trial says state promised him immunity

Feb. 14– A murder trial in a case which took nearly a decade to investigate is moving along unexpectedly quickly, according to the judge.

With four days on the docket reserved, Hardin County Circuit Court Judge Creed McGinley recessed this afternoon at around 3:40 after the prosecution presented eight witnesses.

John Wesley May is accused of first degree murder in the death of 59-year-old Mildred Grant at her Edna Street home in Savannah.

The state contends May strangled Grant when he entered her home to rob her, and then tried to burn the house down to cover up the evidence.

May, 33, is also on trial for charges of especially aggravated robbery, aggravated arson and tampering with evidence.

May lived next door to Grant when she was killed on Nov. 15, 2001. He was arrested in Florida in January 2010.

Representing May, attorney Curt Hopper of Savannah rapidly launched into a critique of the state’s investigation.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "this case is a mess. It’s hard to describe what’s happened over the last nine years."

Jurors thus far are hearing of a death threat allegedly made against Grant by a relative that she reported to Savannah police a few weeks before she was killed, about inconclusive DNA evidence, and conflicting "confessions" made in connection with the victim’s death.

Grant’s own daughter, Cybill Grant, is charged with accessory after the fact of first degree murder and accessory after the fact of arson. The judge said Cybill "may or may not testify" in the May trial.

Cybill in one statement to investigators implicated herself, May and the now deceased Jason Stricklin in the crime. However, William Nathan Nave testified that he and May had been riding around drinking and visiting a friend in Adamsville before they went to Mildred’s home and May killed her.

Both versions point the finger at May and Hopper is arguing that both can’t be true.

According to Nave, May proposed that he and Nave "go rob Mildred. She’s got all kinds of money and pills."

Thinking May was "kidding," Nave said he sat in May’s car parked at May’s residence. May first went inside his own home, then walked across the yard and into Grant’s.

After perhaps 10 or 15 minutes May came out on Grant’s porch with a pipe in his hand and motioned for Nave to come over.

Nave said he saw Grant on the floor, checked her for a pulse and asked May what happened.

"He said he hit her in the back of the head and she started screaming...and that’s when he put the pipe on her throat and chocked her," Nave continued.

He said May wanted him to help him carry the body to the nearby boat ramp on Cravens Road for disposal because Grant had bitten his finger in the struggle, leaving possible DNA traces, but he refused.

Nave said he then waited in the car while May got a gas jug from his house and went over to Grant’s. When May came back, they drove to the boat ramp where May tossed the pipe, the victim’s purse and the fuel container into the Tennessee River.

May tried to give him some of the money from the robbery, but he refused to take it, Nave said.

During Hopper’s cross-examination of the witness, Nave said he had been questioned repeatedly by investigators over the years, but came forward with his statement accusing May only in early 2010.

Asked why he did not admit his involvement earlier, Nave said the matter had begun weighing too heavily on his conscience.

"You consistently lied for years," said Hopper. "You’re a liar."

Nave, who said the district attorney’s office promised him immunity from prosecution for his testimony, replied, "Yeah."

Johnny Hays, a special agent with the state Bomb and Arson Section, testified that Grant’s badly burned, partially charred body was found lying face-up on her bedroom floor near the door. Her socks were rolled down around her ankles, indicating she had been dragged to that location.

"Normally if you die in a fire, you die face down," he said. "What-nots" knocked off a nearby shelf showed there had been a struggle, and distinct, separate burned areas in the room are evidence of arson.

Despite the gasoline investigators determined was used to light the fire, the house did not burn down because it consumed all the oxygen in the building and it smothered, Hays concluded.