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Man acquitted of murder says he is blessed; family of victim feels cheated
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BATON ROUGE — For fifty years, the 19th Judicial District Court has maintained a conviction rate of more than 90 percent. It's highly unusual for a person the state is prosecuting to be found not guilty, but it happened earlier this month when a jury acquitted Kevin Dukes of the murder of Julius Thomas.
Now Dukes is a free man.
"It's a lot of people that's in prison that hasn't committed the crime and I was just one of the ones that was blessed," Dukes said.
Dukes spent 17 months in jail awaiting trial after being arrested in 2018 for the murder of Thomas.
"Regardless of being arrested for it, I'm still supposed to be presumed innocent but instead I was presumed guilty," he said.
Public perception of Dukes was negative, given his criminal history and his arrest for another murder in Livingston parish, which a jury declined to indict him on.
"I made mistakes. I don't deny my past because it is who I am today."
Dukes and Thomas knew each other. He contracted Thomas to do upholstery work at his mechanic business King of Carz La.
Thomas was found shot to death on a Tuesday, and Dukes was arrested the next day.
"I knew I was innocent. At the end of the day, I knew what I knew and I knew the reasoning behind their actions, like they didn't care about actually finding out the truth. I was just another person being abused in the system. That's how I perceive it as."
For Thomas's family, the two-week trial was not only disheartening but devastating.
"The way they killed my brother and they left him...." said Joycelyn Davies, Thomas's sister.
Thomas's body was found wrapped in a tarp and dumped on South Flannery Road in December 2018.
Investigators discovered Thomas was likely shot and killed at Duke's business due to the amount of blood found there.
Blood was also discovered on Dukes' car parked at his home. Cell phone records showed the pair had talked that day.
And then there was the receipt with Thomas's blood on it, which the prosecution claims Dukes had in his possession.
"To have 338 pieces of evidence — the smoking gun for me was the receipt in the truck that was left abandoned and still not guilty," said Davies. "The jurors did not do their civic duty or their job."
Dukes and his defense claim it's all circumstantial.
"I can infer what I like. I can create a storyline. I can infer the negative aspect, but I have to also see the positive because keep in mind in the legal system it's based off of reasonable doubt," Dukes said.
A solid motive was never really offered up, other than a floating theory that Thomas may have owed Dukes some money.
"I wanted to know why. We never got that," Davies said.
The family is convinced the jury made a mistake.
"Imma say he lucked up. He got lucky. He got the right people to do and say what needed to be done this time. This time."
Dukes offers his condolences to the family.
"I'm sorry for them and their loss. I understand. That's still somebody's uncle, somebody's dad. I don't have an issue with those people but I do have an issue with the way I was treated," he said.
As for what's next for him, Dukes has left the city that he was born and raised in.
"Truthfully, I'm scared to go back in the business. Whatever it is, I know it has to be away from here."
Thomas's family's future is just as uncertain.
"My brother was killed. They finished killing the rest of our family because...we're just numb inside," Davies said.
As for the murder charge in Livingston parish — a jury declined to indict Dukes, however, that doesn't mean he can't be charged again if more evidence is discovered. He cannot be retried for Thomas's murder as he was officially declared not guilty.
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