— After a 21-year-old Baltimore woman testified that Tyrone Hall was neither provoked nor attacked by the two Frostburg State University basketball players he shot last April, four of Hall's friends said that Ellis Hartridge Jr. taunted Hall and lunged at him right before the 21-year-old Glen Burnie man shot Hartridge and teammate Brandon Carroll.
The only part of the testimony of Patrice Britton and Hall's friends that matched up was that the former Mount St. Joseph soccer standout fired the shotgun that Britton said he had purchased weeks before at a local pawnshop. The first shotgun blast injured Hartridge, then 21, of Washington; the second killed Carroll, 20, of Waldorf.
Hall, who is on trial facing charges of first-degree murder, first-degree attempted murder and first-degree assault, could take the stand in his own defense Thursday. Hall has pleaded not guilty and said he acted in self-defense.
Britton, who was Hartridge's live-in girlfriend before he moved out of the off-campus apartment they shared last November and who had dated Hall, said in Allegany County Circuit Court that she didn't think the confrontation would get violent — or deadly — when she followed Hartridge to Hall's apartment about 3:30 a.m. April 18.
"I knew he [Hartridge] was mad, but I didn't think they were going to fight," said Britton, who had informed Hartridge of a run-in she had had with Hall at an off-campus party earlier in the evening.
Asked why she had followed him to Hall's apartment, Britton said, "I wanted to be with my boyfriend."
But Hall's roommate and former high school soccer teammate, Chris Mumby, and friends David Darko, Brian Davis and Kyle Jackson said Hartridge threatened Hall before coming over with Carroll and another man. Hall's friends also testified that Hartridge baited Hall at close range when he saw Hall come out of his residence holding the shotgun.
Hall's friends also disputed Britton's account of what happened at the party. She said that she texted Hartridge to tell him that "Bobo" — her nickname for Hall — "smacked me in the face" after she laughed because he was dancing with one of her friends. Hall's friends said Britton pushed the woman and smacked Hall at the party.
Unlike Hartridge, who broke down several times when he mentioned Carroll's name while testifying Tuesday, Britton was mostly stoic during defense attorney's William Brennan questioning, until she walked out of the courtroom. Once outside, she sobbed in the embrace of a friend.
Hall's friends were unemotional for the most part in giving their accounts of that day.
They explained how two of them came to Frostburg to play in a soccer tournament and go to a couple of parties. They testified that a quiet off-campus party became crowded and that Britton became involved in a dispute with Hall and a woman he was dancing with who turned out to be one of Britton's friends, pushing the woman and slapping Hall.
Darko, who coaches soccer at Beth T'filoh and attends the University of the District of Columbia, said he could hear Hartridge threaten Hall in a cell phone conversation with Davis later that night.
"He said he was coming over to [mess] you up," recalled Darko, who played with Hall on club soccer teams for several years. "He [Hartridge] said, 'I'm coming with my guns and crew and [mess] you up."
Davis, who was playing soccer for Frostburg at the time, said that Hartridge had called earlier and told him to have Hall and his friend meet him at "The Projects" — an off-campus apartment complex where Hartridge had lived with Britton.
Davis said that Hartridge then told him that he was coming to Hall's residence, and when he showed up 15 minutes later — along with a few cars full of friends — "he looked very angry, he was antsy." Davis said Hartridge asked Hall at least four times, "Are you going to bust [shoot] me?" and seemed to lurch closer to Hall each time.
Davis said Hartridge finally lunged at Hall, who, according to testimony from a ballistics expert Wednesday, fired from less than 10 feet away.
Allegany County State's Attorney Michael O. Twigg said pointedly to each of Hall's friends that they were merely trying to protect him, that their testimony was both planned and flawed, given that none of them had mentioned to police the night of the incident that they saw Hartridge and Carroll threaten Hall physically.
Twigg said that one of Hall's friends, Davis, wrote in his statement that he only heard the gunshots and was still in the apartment when Hall fired the weapon.
"I was scared, I didn't know what was going to happen," said Davis, who along with the other friends was arrested that night but later released by police.
Twigg also questioned why Hall's friends came out of the residence in the first place and why none of them called the police to report the shootings.
"I looked up the street and saw Ellis calling for help," recalled Darko. "We all went back inside and waited for the police."
Mumby, who played with Hall at Mount St. Joseph, said that he couldn't remember what he wrote or said to police that night.
"I was traumatized because I saw my best friend shoot two people, and the police told me one of them was dead," Mumby said.