Defendant offers double denial

Tuesday, May 25, 1999 | 11:26 a.m.

Jurors in the murder trial of Tyrone Laffayette Garner twice heard the defendant deny his involvement in the robbery and slaying of a Doc Holliday's Tavern bartender.

First a Metro Police detective on Monday played a tape recording of a statement Garner gave on May 8, 1998, three days after the execution-style killing of Shelly Lokken on the graveyard shift. Later Garner took the stand and said he had "no idea whatsoever" that the man he drove to the bar would commit murder and rob the place.

Closing arguments will be today in the courtroom of District Judge Michael Douglas. Jurors will have to determine if Garner was duped into driving the killer to the bar at 8450 Westcliff Drive or was a willing accomplice.

Garner, 42, maintains he was just driving a friend, 32-year-old Charles Randolph, to the bar to pick up his pay after being fired a few days earlier. Randolph's trial is scheduled for later this year.

Garner faces murder charges under Nevada law that makes all members of a criminal act equally responsible for any death.

Metro Police homicide detective Phil Ramos, under questioning from Deputy District Attorney David Wall, played a tape recording of the interview he conducted with Garner. In it he asks Garner why he did not call the police after he saw newscasts about the slaying, which included a description of his car leaving the scene.

"Confusion, I guess," Garner replied. "Scared. Under the influence (of crack). Stupid. Not thinking. A whole list of things."

Also on the police recording, Garner was asked about a 9 mm pistol and the security video cassette recorder that was stolen from the bar and found in the trunk of his Cadillac.

Garner testified that he thought the VCR belonged to Randolph.

"If I knew" a robbery and murder were going to be committed, he said, "I wouldn't have left all of that stuff in my car."

After the slaying, Garner and Randolph went to a trailer where they and two prostitutes got high on cocaine. Randolph left before Garner saw the newscasts about the crime. The women later called police, according to testimony during the trial that began May 17.

Under questioning from his attorney David Schieck, Garner said that when he saw the newscasts he "put two and two together that something had transpired without my knowledge and that my car had been used. I was shocked. I was scared. I was afraid Charles would kill me also."

Asked if he knew the bar was going to be robbed, Garner, who was employed by a grocery store at the time, said, "I had no idea whatsoever. I thought he was a working man like me."

On both the police tape and on the stand Garner said he did not go inside the bar.

Garner admitted to being "loaded on cocaine" when police initially questioned him May 5 and that he lied in that interview.

Garner also admitted to two prior felony convictions -- second degree robbery in 1989 and possession of cocaine later. He testified that the more than $400 in small bills that police found in the trailer was earnings from cocaine he had sold, not from the bar robbery.

Under later questioning from Schieck, Garner said he had come down from his high by the time he gave his May 8 statement to police and "was thinking clearly."

The prosecution maintains that Garner, who backed his car up to the bar, was the lookout and getaway driver who waited outside while Randolph robbed, then killed, Lokken. There was no one else in the bar at the time.

A security guard at a nearby apartment complex saw Garner's car leaving Doc Holliday's with its lights off. However, the defense has maintained that Garner did not speed from the scene and that, a few blocks away, his car ran out of gas and had to be pushed to a service station on Decatur Boulevard.

Lokken's family has since filed a lawsuit against the bar/restaurant, alleging that the tavern failed to have adequate security measures for its employees and customers.