Courtroom footage of Reginald Louis Jackson yelling at the judge during his court appearance on April 22 (WTVJ).
A Florida man accused of double murder walked out of court on the day he was expected to plead guilty.
Reginald Louis Jackson, 40, is charged with two counts each of first-degree murder, kidnapping, and robbery among other charges in connection with the 2013 murders of Annette Anderson, 69, and her grandson Tyrone Lenard Walker Jr., 20. Jackson appeared in a Miami-Dade, Florida, courtroom on Wednesday and was expected to plead guilty, along with his co-defendant, 39-year-old Roderick Martin.
But when Jackson did not see his mother in the gallery, the hearing took a turn.
Local NBC affiliate WTVJ was in the courtroom when they captured Jackson”s outburst. According to WTVJ, Jackson and Martin were both charged in connection with the double murder and were both expected to enter guilty pleas. The deals would have resulted in a 40-year sentence for Jackson and a 25-year sentence for Martin.
The deals would have ended the legal delays and avoided the need for a trial nearly 13 years after Anderson and Walker were allegedly found on July 16, 2013, bound and gagged with gunshot wounds to the backs of their heads in a home in Miami. Anderson was a minister at Jesus People Ministries. Walker had just moved to the area to study electrical engineering at ITT Institute, and he worked at Burger King on the side.
Jackson and Martin were handcuffed to each other when they showed up in court on a day that their cases were not originally scheduled to be heard. The judge agreed to hear their cases since there was an expectation of guilty pleas. However, those pleas were derailed when Jackson looked for members of his family and did not see his mother.
As he started yelling profanities in court, Jackson said his grandmother was at one of his hearings and died three months later. He said it was the last time he ever saw her, and he did not want to take a chance at not seeing his mother again.
“I want my mom,” he said, according to WTVJ.
While still handcuffed to Martin, Jackson started walking out of court, and their plea deals were rejected. Jackson and Martin remain in custody and are due back in court on May 5.
