Luddie Austin thought about tracking down and killing the man who helped kill his son, James, in February 2013.
(left to right) Amanda Austin holding Jakalya, one of James Austin's twin daughters, Kim Bellamy, and Luddie Austin holding the other twin Janalya.
On those days, when he contemplated taking out convicted killer Raheem Currie, the retired Trenton Police sergeant found solace in the people in his corner. Guys like Lester Ponder, a fellow veteran and close family friend.
It also helped that Luddie Austin remembered when his son was 12 years old, waiting deep for the kickoff during a youth football game for the Willingboro Panthers. They were playing the Trenton Tornadoes, and father and son made a little wager.
James wanted a gas-powered remote control car. His dad said he'd buy him one if he scored a touchdown. James took back the opening kickoff, and proceeded to tack on five more touchdowns, as the Panthers walloped Trenton.
“He earned it,” Luddie Austin told Judge Pedro Jimenez at Friday’s sentencing. “He didn’t take it like the defendant took his life.”
Vengeance percolated, but in the end, Luddie Austin couldn’t fathom the thought of dishonoring his son’s memory. Killing Currie while he was out on bail would have been biblical and cathartic, but it also would have been selfish.
It would have added another dimension to what Jimenez called a “human drama,” played out in Trenton over the last three years, and bookended when the judge sent Currie to prison for 23 years for aggravated manslaughter, conspiracy and a weapons charge.
James Austin with his twin daughters.
Jimenez said there was nothing Currie could do for the Austin family “unless you’re the Lord Jesus Christ raising Lazarus from the dead.”
Currie must serve 19 ½ years before he’s eligible for parole for enlisting his cousin, Robert Bartley, to bring a gun that was used to kill James Austin.
Bartley, who is expected to get 25 years for shooting the cop’s son, said he never intended to kill Austin, only intervene in a fight James Austin and his cousin had over broken car windows.
It didn’t end that way, shattering the new father's goal to become a corrections officer and "help clean up Trenton and make it safe" for his twin daughters, said Yvonne Maxwell, Currie's mother.
And it may never end.
“My son died in a city I swore to protect. We’re not gonna give up,” Luddie Austin said. “Even 19 years from now, when he comes up for parole, someone’s gonna be there.”
Luddie Austin was prescient.
The case is far from over, and it may not get far if Currie’s attorneys have their way.
Currie’s case it part of a legal sermon on a state Supreme Court case, State v. Bridges, intent and how it squares away with Currie’s culpability.
Jack Furlong, Currie’s attorney, and the judge had different interpretations of how the Bridges case came to bear into Currie’s trial, one side saying it allows for defendants to be held accountable for the murderous actions of others even if they didn’t intend the outcome, the other side saying not so much.
Raheem Currie
Furlong and an associate contended in court papers the jury’s “inconsistent” verdict – not guilty of murder and conspiracy to possess a weapon for an unlawful purpose and guilty of aggravated manslaughter, conspiracy to possess a weapon and weapon possession – suggested the panel was confused by the judge’s instructions on the law.
And for that reasons, and others, Furlong asked for a new trial and for the verdict to be set aside.
His argument centered largely on the Bridges case involving a Trenton man who brought his crew, armed with guns, so he could fight another man, fair and square.
Shots popped off, someone died, and Bennie Bridges went to prison for murder-conspiracy, even though he didn’t fire a shot and didn’t intend to.
The court said his actions were “reasonable foreseeable” since he brought goons with guns.
Ditto for Currie, Jimenez offered at the trial, when he said: “Why else bring a gun to a fist fight?”
The judge augmented those statements Friday, in denying the request for a new trial, while acknowledging the case law on accomplice liability is murky and undeveloped.
Nonetheless, he said Bartley was neither “invited guest” nor “peacemaker” and was brought to James’ house with a purpose, which he claimed was to get the cop’s son to pay for the shattered windows.
Instead, James Austin paid with his life. And Currie must pay, too, for “setting into motion” Bartley’s actions in the “toxic, hostile” situation.
The judge surmised Currie’s anger was the driving force.
“None of this would have happened if Currie didn’t make the call,” Jimenez said.
Furlong retorted: “None of this would have happened if Bartley said, ‘You know what? I’m not going.’”
In making his argument for argument’s sake, Furlong maintained his client admits nothing about what Bartley testified to at trial: that not only did Currie know about his gun, but that he asked him to bring it with him, during a phone call shortly after Currie and James Austin scuffled over the busted-out car windows.
Robert Bartley
No one who was in the car with Currie apparently heard him say as much. So therefore, Furlong said, his client didn’t express intent to kill James Austin, perhaps only to bring a gun.
“I can’t square the circle,” he said.
Channeling his attorney, Currie said he was remorseful but “not so much for my actions but for the culmination of the events that happened.”
Luddie Austin said he hasn’t forgiven the cousins. He also doesn’t accept Currie’s contention he didn’t know what was going to go down.
“The day has come for Justice for James,” he said.
Another day will surely come for Currie.
And when it does, the proud father who contemplated murder will be there to make sure his son's killer isn’t let loose.