Attorney said Springfield man is innocent as four murder charges are dropped

Prosecutors dismissed criminal charges Tuesday against a Springfield man accused of killing four people in a north-side motel room in 2014.

A prosecutor said he anticipates charges will be refiled against Scott Goodwin-Bey, 49, but Goodwin-Bey's attorney said his client is innocent and he hopes authorities capture the real killer, or killers.

"It was a flimsy case all along," said Chris Hatley, a public defender representing Goodwin-Bey.

Goodwin-Bey was scheduled to stand trial for the killings in early January.

When authorities charged Goodwin-Bey in February 2015, they said he shot four people to death inside Room 149 at the Economy Inn on North Glenstone Avenue because he believed the victims — Trevor Fantroy, 43, Lewis Green, 44, Danielle Keyes, 29, and Christopher Freeman, 24 — were informing police about his drug use.

Hatley said witnesses in the case were "beyond shaky," calling them drug addicts and criminals, but the crux of the case centered on a gun allegedly used in the killings linked to Goodwin-Bey.

A judge ruled in December that a gun Goodwin-Bey allegedly gave to a convenience store clerk could not be incontrovertibly connected to bullets found at the scene of the killings.

Hatley said prosecutors knew they couldn't convince a jury that Goodwin-Bey, an ex-convict, was guilty, so two weeks before the case was to go to trial, they dropped the charges.

"I would characterize it as the prosecutorial equivalent to throwing a temper tantrum," Hatley said. "They didn't like how it was going to so they took their ball home — kinda like my 9-year-old."

Dropping the charges means Goodwin-Bey had to spend two years in the Greene County Jail for nothing, Hatley said. It also means prosecutors can refile charges and start the process over again.

“The law allows (prosecutors) to dismiss it and refile it as many times as they want,” Hatley said. “We’ll be happy to beat them the next time, too.”

Prosecutors said Wednesday that Goodwin-Bey remains the only suspect in the homicides.

Todd Myers, Greene County chief assistant prosecutor, said prosecutors dropped the charges against Goodwin-Bey because of the judge's ruling regarding the ballistic evidence in the case. He declined to elaborate.

Myers said prosecutors anticipate re-filing charges against Goodwin-Bey after additional testing is complete. He couldn't say when that would be.

Myers said prosecutors could not appeal Judge Calvin Holden's decision regarding the ballistics, but they hope to present their evidence to a different judge after more testing is done.

"Because the defendant is in federal custody and is not going to be released, the state has the benefit of additional time to pursue this course of action."

Court documents filed within the last two months show Goodwin-Bey’s public defenders sparring with the prosecutor’s office over the science used in linking bullets to the guns that fired them.

Steve Kellogg, another public defender who represented Goodwin-Bey, said the science is based on an "absurd standard" and should not be introduced during the trial, court documents show.

“This so-called ‘science’ amounts to nothing more than a person looking through a microscope and saying: ‘This one looks like that one,’” Kellogg wrote. “That is the essence of the firearm and toolmark trade — and it is why the top independent scientists and legal scholars of our country have become highly critical of this practice.”

Holden ruled on Dec. 16 to "reluctantly" allow a ballistics expert to testify, but "only to the point this gun could not be eliminated as the source of the bullet."

Hatley said cases all over the country that link bullets to guns are being re-examined after a 2009 report from the National Academy of Sciences "completely lambasted" the practice.

Hatley said he and Kellogg visited Goodwin-Bey in the Greene County Jail Tuesday to tell him four first-degree murder and four armed criminal action charges had been dropped.

"(Goodwin-Bey) was very relieved. He maintained his innocence all along," Hatley said. "He was looking at four consecutive life sentences without probation and parole ... I can't even begin to put myself in his shoes."

Goodwin-Bey, who was convicted of a federal gun charge in October, will remain in federal custody. He was listed on the Greene County Jail roster Wednesday morning.

The probable cause statement used to charge Goodwin-Bey relied heavily on an eyewitness identified as E.B. who allegedly told police he was in the room when Goodwin-Bey shot the four victims on Nov. 15, 2014.

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The statement says E.B. told police he believed he would have been killed too, but he was able to flee the motel room.

The statement also details some strange behavior from Goodwin-Bey in the days following the shooting.

Goodwin-Bey allegedly went to a convenience store at 3905 W. Chestnut Expressway on Nov. 30, 2014, and handed one of the clerks a gun — police believed it was the same gun he used in the shooting.

Police confiscated the gun and arrested Goodwin-Bey that day, the statement says.

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Goodwin-Bey was found guilty in October on a federal charge of being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm in connection with the convenience store incident. He faces up to 10 years in federal prison on that conviction.

In December of 2014, a federal judge ordered that Goodwin-Bey be held without bail on his gun charge, citing Goodwin-Bey’s “substance abuse history, present mental status, history of weapons use, pattern of similar criminal activity history, and history of assaultive behavior.”

The judge also wrote that Goodwin-Bey had an “unstable/unsuitable living situation,” no job and had been “exhibiting paranoia.”

That order for Goodwin-Bey to be held without bail is still in effect until he is sentenced in the federal gun case. A sentencing date has not yet been set.

Attorney Shane Cantin represents Goodwin-Bey in the federal case. He said Goodwin-Bey would have been in jail since December 2014 regardless of the murder charges.

"His criminal history was such that he was going to be detained in federal court, and there was little to no way around that decision," Cantin said.

Court records indicate Goodwin-Bey has been found guilty in the past of drug possession, unlawful use of a weapon, conspiracy to distribute cocaine and unlawful possession of a weapon.