The state rested its case Friday afternoon in the capital murder trial of a 67-year-old woman accused of shooting a fellow square dancer in 2013.
"Motive does not equal murder, your honor," Pickett argued. "Witnesses that have provided testimony in this case all go to motive, your honor. Their testimony has nothing to do with factual evidence. None of this type of testimony and evidence provides a legally factual basis to support a finding of guilt."
Pickett said the lay witnesses who took the stand on the state's behalf, many of whom were friends of Wheelington's, had been duped into thinking Hyatt was wrong about the affair between her husband and Wheelington.
"They've been fooled. And these are people with a lot of life experience who were sincerely wrong in their beliefs that James Hyatt and Patricia Wheelington weren't having an affair," Pickett said.
James Hyatt, Virginia Hyatt's estranged husband, admitted on the stand Tuesday that he and Wheelington had become romantic in 2009.
Circuit Judge Randy Wright disagreed with Pickett's assessment of the state's case and ruled the trial should proceed.
James Hyatt testified earlier in the week that he left his wife Nov. 29, 2013, because he feared she would do him harm. He and other witnesses said Virginia Hyatt's intensely jealous nature and obvious dislike for Wheelington led them to worry for Wheelington's safety as well.
Texarkana, Ark., police Detective Tye Whatley testified Friday that he assisted the investigation by accessing voice mails, text messages and other data from Wheelington's cellphone. Three voice messages left at 2:17 p.m., 2:20 p.m., and 2:22 p.m. by Virginia Hyatt for Wheelington the day James Hyatt left his wife were incomprehensible recordings of wailing, pleading and screaming. Hyatt's voice was calmer when she left Wheelington a message at 7:58 a.m. the following day, Nov. 30, 2013.
"Hey, please, please give me my husband back. Please, this is horrible. You can get you any man in the street, anywhere. Can you call me back? Are you there? Can you hear me? Please call me back," Hyatt said on the voice message.
Whatley reviewed the calls and texts Wheelington received the day of her death, beginning with a call logged at 7:17 a.m. from a contact listed as "MF."
James Hyatt testified Wednesday that the number associated with the contact MF is for a cellphone Wheelington gave him.
Whatley continued to chronicle the calls Wheelington received the morning of her murder. The last time Wheelington spoke to anyone on the phone was a one-minute, 51-second call at 7:57 a.m. to Ken Caldwell. Caldwell died of illness shortly after Wheelington's murder and was not available to testify.
Caldwell continued to call and leave messages for Wheelington throughout the day. At around 3 p.m., Caldwell began asking Wheelington if she was coming to pick him up as they had planned, but she never did.
Friends of Wheelington's called her repeatedly. Late that afternoon, Barbara Ricketts and Phyllis Nabors discovered Wheelington's lifeless body outstretched on her front porch, a cigarette still between the fingers of her right hand.
Texarkana, Ark., police Detective Jason Haak testified he and Detective Paul Nall interviewed Virginia Hyatt on Dec. 4, 2013, at the Bi-State Justice Building in downtown Texarkana at about 2 a.m., shortly after her arrest. Haak said Hyatt seemed, "nonchalant" and didn't ask why she was in custody. Haak said she at first denied she'd been to Wheelington's home the morning of Dec. 2 to confront her.
Ricketts testified Thursday that Wheelington was shaken and upset by an unannounced visit from Hyatt the day before the shooting. Text messages and phone records Whatley testified to support Ricketts' and other witnesses' testimonies about the incident.
Haak said Hyatt claimed she was in the drive-thru of McDonalds on East Seventh Street in Texarkana, Ark., buying her nursing home-bound mother a sausage biscuit at approximately 8 a.m., the time investigators believe Wheelington was killed, and that she told them she next drove to the nursing home and stayed for an hour.
But video surveillance from the restaurant shows Hyatt left the drive-thru at 9:30 a.m. and the nursing home video shows she spent 12 minutes visiting her mother afterward, Nall testified. He testified that video surveillance from a convenience store, a fireworks store and an automotive business along U.S. Highway 82 shows a car that looks like Virginia Hyatt's Lincoln Town Car driving in the direction of Wheelington's home at 7:53 a.m. and driving the opposite direction at 8:16 a.m.
Under cross examination by Pickett, Nall agreed that Hyatt visited her mother's nursing home nearly every day and that being confused about the time at which she was there on a specific day isn't surprising. Nall also agreed that the tag number of the white sedan seen on video footage can't be identified.
Witnesses who have testified this week described Hyatt as jealous of all women, especially single ones who might dance with her husband at Guys and Dolls Square Dancing Club in Texarkana. But the two defense witnesses who took the stand Friday afternoon said they had never seen her behave jealously.
Sylvia Jordan, a Guys and Dolls member, said Hyatt has trouble getting around, suffers from diabetes and that she has small, arthritic hands, under questioning from Condit. Under cross examination from Stephanie Black, Jordan said Hyatt "can dance, but she doesn't move very fast."
"Would you agree that you wouldn't have to move very fast to shoot somebody sitting in a chair?" Stephanie Black asked Jordan.
Jerry Ward told the jury he and his wife, Ann Ward, quit Guys and Dolls because they "saw some stuff going on that was detrimental to square dancing." Ward said he never heard Hyatt speak negatively of Wheelington or anyone else, contradicting testimony from other Guys and Dolls members who testified for the state.
Chief Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Chuck Black asked Ward if he agreed with statements his wife made to police "that Patti Wheelington got exactly what she deserved."
Testimony from witnesses for the defense are expected to continue Monday morning. Because prosecutors are not seeking the death penalty, Virginia Hyatt faces life without parole if convicted of capital murder.