Shane Tassi’s murder trial got underway Monday morning with jury selection in Baldwin County Superior Court.
Tassi is accused of fatally shooting Syee Havior in the doublewide mobile home where he lived off Black Springs Road in February 2023. The 18-year-old Havior was a senior at Baldwin High School. The defendant and victim in the case were second cousins.
Detectives with the Baldwin County Sheriff’s Office, with assistance from agents with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation Region 6 Office in Milledgeville, arrested four suspects in connection with the case.
The four co-defendants were indicted on identical charges by a Baldwin County grand jury in connection with the case. The charges included malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault, home invasion and burglary in the first degree.
Three of the four co-defendants — Jarius Tremon Washington, Malik Atravon Smith and Derrius Holmes — have pleaded guilty to lesser charges and were sentenced to 20 years each for their part in the crime spree.
The trio agreed at the time of their sentencing to testify as witnesses on behalf of the state in Tassi’s trial, which is expected to last at least a week and a half, according to Ocmulgee Judicial Circuit District Attorney T. Wright Barksdale III. He is joined by Assistant District Attorney Sydney Segers, who will conduct some of the interviews with witnesses in the case. Also seated at the prosecution table is Georgia Bureau of Investigation Special Agent Ethan Brown, the case agent.
Brown is expected to testify in the case.
The prosecution had originally planned to call nearly 100 witnesses, but that list has narrowed down to about 30, Barksdale told Ocmulgee Judicial Circuit Superior Court Judge Amanda S. Petty.
Jury selection was scheduled to start shortly after 9 a.m. Monday, but Tassi’s new lead defense attorney, Matt Tucker, was late getting to court. He didn’t arrive until about 10:20 a.m. He was just hired by the defendant’s family last week.
Shortly after sitting down at the defense table with court-appointed defense attorney Michael Alexander of Macon, Petty found Tucker in contempt of court.
“I find it extremely disrespectful that you held this court up for an hour and a half,” Petty told Tucker.
The out-of-town criminal defense attorney apologized to the court, saying he had cellphone signal problems while driving along Interstate 16 to get to Milledgeville. He said he had attempted to reach the court while en route but was unable to do so.
Petty told him she would deal with the contempt matter later in the day.
Barksdale said he wanted the record to reflect that the has been a case that they have been marching toward a trial date since earlier this year.
Tucker requested that he be allowed to have some time to review the videos in the case. He suggested a couple of hours.
“I would love any kind of assistance that I could get from the previous attorney,” Tucker said.
Barksdale said he had never met Tucker before and he wanted to make sure the record was clear.
“The first conversation that my office had was a phone call about 2:30 p.m. last Friday afternoon,” Barksdale said. “And then about 3:30, an entry was apparently made. As far as discovery, I want the record to reflect going all the way back to Ms. Clark that we had an open-file policy that she review the evidence that we had.”
The district attorney said Alexander later joined her on the case.
“I met with him several times, probably a total of four about this case,” Barksdale said. “I went over my witnesses. There are 90-something witnesses on our witness list, but that’s been paired down to about 30.”
All of the physical evidence pertaining to the case also has been gone over with Alexander, he said.
“I want the record to reflect that it would take probably in the neighborhood of 15 to 20 hours to watch all the interviews,” Barksdale said. “What I’m asking this court to do is to place the defendant under oath and get him to make the election of whether or not he wants to move forward with the attorney that’s been provided for him or if he’s wanting to have this new defense attorney represent him. It’s ultimately his choice as I understand it. But I do believe the record needs to be clear that it’s his choice.”
Petty said the case has been set for trial twice previously.
“I am not holding this trial up,” Petty said. “Mr. Tucker has not asked for a continuance.”
The judge later had Tassi stand before her and raise his right hand as to who he wanted as his attorney. He chose Tucker as his lead attorney.
Petty later summoned for prospective jurors to be called into the courtroom so they could be questioned by attorneys on both sides.
Once a 12-person jury and alternates have been selected to hear testimony and evidence in the case, opening statements will begin, followed by state witnesses giving testimony.
