Samantha Marion, the woman charged with the fatal March 12 shooting of Ricky Floyd, the late senior lead pastor of Pursuit of God Church, during a religious dispute outside a bar in Memphis, Tennessee, allegedly told police she shot him by mistake.
The 42-year-old Marion, who is free on bond on a charge of voluntary manslaughter in Floyd's death, appeared in court for a preliminary hearing where a special district attorney working on the case called only one witness, Patrolman Cordell Boyd, who was the first officer to arrive at the crime scene. Floyd was shot outside Momma's Bar and Kitchen located at 855 Kentucky Road.
At the hearing, according to News Action 5, the district attorney played the audio of Marion’s 911 call admitting to shooting Floyd.
Boyd testified that when he arrived on the scene, Marion was “basically mumbling, like ‘Lord help.’”
“She was basically mumbling like Lord help, something like that. And then I asked a question, ‘Where’s the shooter?’ and she said, ‘It’s me,’” Boyd told the court.
He then recounted what he said Marion told him about the shooting.
“The first time when the victim approached her, she went to her car and armed herself. She told me she put the gun behind her back. She had it behind her back. She said several times in the exchange, the victim kept approaching her and she kept telling the victim to ‘back, back,’” he said.
“The last time she said she then moved her hand, took the gun off safety, and then the last time telling the victim to ‘back, back,’ she reached forward and accidentally fired a shot,” he added.
Boyd further told the court that if Marion felt threatened enough to go to her vehicle for a gun, she could have left the scene.
Marion’s lawyer, John Keith Perry, did not call any witnesses and told News Action 5 that it is the prosecutor who has the burden of trying to establish probable cause.
“They have a burden to try to establish probable cause and that’s all this hearing was about. We’re trying to see what their affidavit was saying versus what the facts show,” he said.
“According to the testimony that was rendered, a person who had an opportunity to leave didn’t leave. You had him indicating that there were certain things left out of the affidavit that were important that the gentleman had knocked down at least one person and had a second altercation with another intervening person, so those are things we are trying to find out for sure and they were put into the affidavit,” he explained to the news outlet.
Perry noted in a previous report that shortly before Floyd, 58, was shot, the pastor argued with his client and another man, identified as Steven Newsom, who questioned his moral authority inside the bar when he allegedly tried to share religious tracts with them.
"We are also told the argument centered around how Floyd [couldn't] tell anyone anything when he, a pastor, was at this bar and grill at 1 a.m.," Perry said. "We are also told that Samantha Marion was getting the best of him in that argument," according to local news outlet WREG.
Perry said that Floyd grabbed his tracts and stormed out of the bar.
"What was said exactly is not remembered by everybody, but there was no kind of a threat. Or 'I'll see you in the parking lot' or anything like that," said Perry.
Perry said as everyone was leaving outside the bar, Floyd approached Marion, and Newsom got between them. Floyd allegedly knocked Newsom to the ground.
"He stands in front of Reverend Floyd. He's knocked to the ground by Reverend Floyd. And when he does, the back of his head hits the pavement and he becomes a little stunned or dazed," Perry said. "Reverend Floyd then takes the telephone of Miss Marion, and he throws it to the ground and he gives a couple of insults or what have you and then starts to walk off."
Police say Marion called police to the bar at about 1:17 a.m. and confessed to shooting Floyd.
Video surveillance footage reportedly shows Floyd throwing Marion's phone and a beer can before hopping into his vehicle and driving away. Marion allegedly walked into the roadway and appeared to record the pastor's vehicle with her phone.
Marion’s recording shows Floyd exiting his car and confronting her before a witness separates them. As Floyd backed away, police said Marion walked toward the pastor, who was seen falling to the ground and never getting up again.
After hearing the evidence against Marion on Wednesday, the judge in the case found there is probable cause for the voluntary manslaughter. The case has been sent to a grand jury. Marion is expected to remain free on a $100,000 bond.
