Murder Trial Figure Convicted in New Case

A jury Tuesday found Meecee Parks, formerly known as Sagon Penn, guilty of filing false documents in court and of battery in an incident involving his ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend.

In trials in 1986 and 1987, Parks, 28, was acquitted of murder, manslaughter and assault in the death of one San Diego Police officer and the wounding of another officer and a civilian who was in a police car.

He recently changed his name from Sagon Penn to Meecee Parks.

The San Diego Superior Court jury deliberated about 5 1/2 hours before finding Parks guilty Tuesday of all charges.

He was charged with two counts of filing a false document in Superior Court and altering a temporary restraining order against his former girlfriend after it had already been signed by a judge.

Judge Herbert Exarhos set sentencing for Jan. 10 and allowed Parks to remain free on $15,000 bail.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Steve Anear unsuccessfully asked the judge to remand Parks to custody, saying he posed a danger because of his continued harassment of the former girlfriend, Donna Parks.

Meecee Parks faces a maximum sentence of four years and 10 months in state prison plus a $10,000 fine. The charges involving the filing of false documents and altering court records are felonies, but the battery charge is a misdemeanor.

Parks acted as his own attorney Aug. 17 when he met with Judge Wesley Mason and won an order prohibiting Donna Parks from contacting him.

However, the judge later said he saw that the temporary restraining order had been altered to include a ban on Donna Parks’ contacting her new boyfriend, Maurice Bell. Bell was not named as a party in the case, and Mason testified that he would not have signed such a document.

The prosecution’s case took up only one day, and Meecee Parks did not testify in his defense.

Parks’ two trials in San Diego were highly publicized events because Parks, who is black, claimed he shot the white officers because one of them subjected him to racial slurs and a beating after a traffic stop in Encanto on Mar. 31, 1985.