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Court to killer: No new trial

Prosecutor: "Zilpha can truly rest in peace now"

By Richelle Bailey | The McDowell News

Published: November 5, 2009

A man who got away with murder for 15 years is in prison to stay.

The N.C. Court of Appeals has denied 44-year-old Robert Dean Taylor's request for a new trial.

Taylor, formerly of Honaker, Va., was convicted in July 2008 of first-degree murder in the slaying of Zilpha Louise Lowery, a 24-year-old Lake James Restaurant waitress, who disappeared on July 27, 1993.

On Feb. 5, 1994, two hikers happened up a skeleton off Black Bear Road. The body was identified as that of Lowery, and it was determined that she died from blows to the head.

The trial
A jury of six men and six women heard a week's worth of evidence during Taylor's trial in July of last year. They deliberated 11 hours over two days before handing down a verdict of guilty of first-degree murder.

They had the choices of guilty of first-degree murder, second-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter or involuntary manslaughter or not guilty.

Judge James U. Downs sentenced Taylor to life in prison without parole. However, because the crime was committed 15 years prior, he was sentenced under former guidelines, called fair sentencing. Under those rules, life in prison without parole means he'll be eligible for parole after he actively serves 25 years.

The trial basically hinged on the testimony of two people: Taylor and his former roommate, 43-year-old Robin Whited of Swords Creek, Va.

The two lived in a mobile home on Vernon Bradley Road in Old Fort during the time of the murder.

On the afternoon of July 27, 1993, Whited said he returned home from work and Taylor told him he had obtained Lowery's number by going through the phone book and randomly calling people.

They picked up Lowery, went to the ABC store and traveled back to their mobile home. They drank, popped pills and had sex, said Whited.

This was his version of how the events of that evening unfolded: At some point that night, Taylor became enraged at Lowery because she was his date but was spending more time with Whited. The defendant tried to force himself on Lowery, and she attempted to fight back. Whited jumped to Lowery's aid, but Taylor struck him in the back of the head with a heavy object. He was bleeding and went into the kitchen to get a towel. He later returned to the bedroom to find a lifeless Lowery sprawled on the floor, and Taylor kneeling beside her. Whited admitted that he later drove Taylor to Black Bear, where Taylor disposed of Lowery's body.

Taylor testified and disputed Whited's claims. Here was his story: Whited and Lowery had sex multiple times that evening. At one point, she came into the living room and had sex with Taylor, then returned to Whited's bed. Taylor took a shower, fell asleep on the couch and was awakened by Whited telling him they needed to leave for work because they were late. Lowery was not there, and Taylor contended he didn't ask anything about how she left or where she was.

Investigators interviewed Whited 12 times. They spoke with Taylor only three times because, after that, he refused to talk, even after Whited named Taylor as the killer.

A month after Taylor's conviction, Whited pleaded guilty to accessory after the fact of murder. Judge Downs gave him a three-year suspended sentence and placed him on supervised probation for 30 months.

The appeal
Taylor appealed his conviction on the grounds that the court improperly instructed the jury on Whited's credibility and coerced the panel's verdict.

Three N.C. Court of Appeals judges – Martha Geer, Wanda Bryant and Linda Stephens – reviewed the case and voted 3-0 to deny the defendant's request for a new trial.

The defendant's appeal argued that, when instructing the jury about Whited's credibility, Judge Downs added the phrase "and that reason only," indicating to the jury that it should view Whited's testimony with great care and caution only if it thought he was testifying solely to avoid being charged himself.

" … we cannot conclude that the initial credibility instruction 'tilted the scales' such as to cause the jury to reach its verdict," the Court of Appeals ruling stated.

The defendant's appeal also argued that the judge coerced the jury's verdict by sending them back for further deliberation after they indicated at one point that they were deadlocked 8-4.

The defense also objected to Downs' instructions when he dismissed the jury on the evening of the verdict for a dinner break. The judge allowed them to leave at 6:55 p.m. and told them to return at 8.

"My inclination is to let you work a mite longer, to see if we can have a verdict today," Downs told the jurors. "If we can't, we will adjourn and come back tomorrow morning and crank it up again."

The panel resumed their discussions at 8 p.m. and returned to the courtroom with a verdict at 8:10 p.m.

"Defendant argues that the trial judge coerced a verdict by (1) using this latter language when the jury was 'pretty concrete' in its 8-4 split, (2) then deciding to keep the jury for further deliberations in the evening and (3) when doing so, telling the jury that if no verdict was reached that evening, they would have to 'crank it up again' in the morning."

The Court of Appeals judges disagreed.

"The trial judge used no language threatening to keep the jury until it reached a verdict, but rather told them that they could 'crank it back up' the next morning – a phrase that we do not find threatening or coercive," the decision stated. "Prior to the trial court's supplemental instructions, the jury did indicate it was deadlocked, but it did not subsequently report an inability to reach a verdict."

The reaction
Assistant District Attorney Alex Bass said the 3-0 decision by the Court of Appeals is significant. Since the vote against a new trial was unanimous, he added, Taylor cannot further appeal to the state Supreme Court.

"Zilpha can truly rest in peace now," Bass stated.

One of Lowery's sisters, Reba Hurst, said her family has been able to put a lot of the nightmare behind them since Taylor's trial, but the appeal always loomed.

"We were worried about having to sit through another trial," she said. "It's good to know he'll be in prison for pretty much the rest of his life."

In a letter mailed from Central Prison to The McDowell News in May, Taylor adamantly denied any involvement in Lowery's killing. He blames Whited.

"Robin Whited killed Zilpha Lowery," Taylor wrote, "and I don't know how or why but then on top of that took her out and dumped her in the woods like she was garbage. Then they let him get away with her murder by putting it on me."

He stated in the letter that, if he had murdered her, he would have admitted it.

"Anything I've ever done I owned up to it and took a plea bargain," he wrote. "They at trial offered me a 6 year plea under the old law, even all of the way up until the very last night. I told them for once in my life I'm not even involved and would not plea to something I didn't do. I believed in the system but it's no good."

Taylor states that he didn't know any of the details the investigators wanted to hear.

"… every time I said Robin did it they said OK what did he do with this, how did he do that, where was this and how was that," he wrote. "They wanted details and I didn't have any because I didn't know she was even dead."

He claims his innocence throughout the entire five-page, handwritten letter.

"I'm trying to get anyone to believe a convicted felon who for once in his life is innocent," Taylor wrote. "… the bottom line is I am in prison with a life sentence for a crime that I know absolutely nothing at all about."