Officer’s Trial Ends After Jury Deadlocks

A jury deadlock Tuesday led to a mistrial of charges that a Los Angeles police officer plotted to rob a chain of check-cashing stores where his wife once worked.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Marsha N. Revel declared the mistrial after the jury, which had deliberated for three weeks, reported that it could not reach a verdict on any of eight counts against Officer Bobby R. Marshall and four counts against his wife, Carolyn Marshall.

On Monday, the panel found Carolyn Marshall, 41, not guilty on four counts--the 1989 robbery of more than $25,000 from a Lawndale outlet of the Any Kind check-cashing chain and an alleged conspiracy to rob three other branches.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Efrem M. Grail immediately announced that he will seek to retry the couple, whose defense included a claim that the prosecution was in retaliation for Marshall’s public accusations of racism within the Los Angeles Police Department.

“That was absolutely ridiculous,” Grail said of the defense allegation. “But trying a police officer in this environment is incredibly difficult. When a police officer’s on trial, we’re held to a higher standard.”

A defense attorney, however, said that the mistrial--which occurred with the jury leaning 7 to 5 and 8 to 4 for acquittal on various counts--was evidence that jurors put stock in Marshall’s assertion that the Police Department was out to get him after he testified before the Christopher Commission investigating abuses in the department.

“This was retaliation against a police officer who spoke up against Daryl Gates,” said Edward A. Esqueda, who represented Marshall.

Marshall, 34, was relieved of duty without pay in in April, soon after he and his wife were indicted on charges of robbery, burglary, grand theft, kidnaping for robbery and conspiracy. Still in custody in lieu of $200,000 bail, the 11-year police veteran still faces a police Board of Rights hearing that could lead to his permanent dismissal.

The criminal case centered on testimony of an alleged accomplice, Gregory Sims, who is serving a 14-year sentence for his role in the Any Kind robberies.

According to the prosecution, Marshall recruited Sims in September, 1989, to rob the Lawndale outlet where Carolyn Marshall worked. In exchange for half the take, the couple gave Sims inside information about the business and how to evade police, authorities said.

Armed with a pistol, Sims then confronted Carolyn Marshall and the store’s manager at closing time and took more than $25,000. That November, Sims was arrested as he tried to rob an Any Kind outlet in Torrance. An employee was able to call police while Sims held the manager at gunpoint.

Authorities alleged that Bobby Marshall tried various tactics to prevent Sims from telling authorities about the couple’s involvement, first making a series of hush payments to Sims’ wife, then having her car set afire “as a threat.”

Evidence in the trial included computer tapes from the terminal in Marshall’s patrol car. The tapes, prosecutors said, showed he used it to check on the home addresses of the intended robbery victims.

But one juror who held out for acquittal said outside court Tuesday that “just not enough evidence was presented” to prove the couple’s guilt.

“An accomplice being the No. 1 witness, that was the main problem,” said another juror.