{"id":90442,"date":"2025-12-11T20:17:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-11T20:17:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/90442\/"},"modified":"2025-12-11T20:17:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-11T20:17:08","slug":"judge-orders-new-trial-in-decade-old-murder-case-as-scrutiny-of-oakland-detective-grows-times-herald-online","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/90442\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge orders new trial in decade-old murder case, as scrutiny of Oakland detective grows \u2013 Times Herald Online"},"content":{"rendered":"

OAKLAND \u2014 An Alameda County judge this month overturned another decade-old murder conviction that was secured with the help of Phong Tran, the veteran Oakland homicide detective accused of coercing and paying off witnesses<\/a> throughout his prolific career.<\/p>\n

The ruling by Judge Thomas Stevens marks the third upended guilty verdict tied to the longtime Oakland police officer, who is awaiting trial on several bribery and perjury charges. The burgeoning scandal has already led to multiple lenient plea deals<\/a> and case dismissals<\/a> tied to the detective\u2019s work, along with a review of more than 200 homicide cases<\/a> he either led or touched.<\/p>\n

The latest decision means an Oakland man, 50-year-old Steven Buggs, will get a new trial in the September 2012 slaying of his childhood friend<\/a>, Lester Young, who was shot dead inside Young\u2019s\u00a0East Oakland home.<\/p>\n

Earlier this fall, Judge Stevens ordered an evidentiary hearing over claims that Tran\u2019s investigation was guided by stereotypes of Black men<\/a>, potentially violating the state\u2019s Racial Justice Act. The 2020 law has sought to address racial bias throughout the criminal justice system by allowing defendants a new avenue to challenge certain prosecutions and convictions.<\/p>\n

While investigating the killing, Tran allegedly told Buggs that an all-white jury could see him as a \u201cbig scary Black guy,\u201d and that Buggs \u201cmight as well squeeze that noose a little tighter\u201d if he didn\u2019t confess to the shooting, according to court filings.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Alameda County\u2019s public defender urged District Attorney Ursula Jones Dickson to dismiss the case and release Buggs from custody \u201cimmediately.\u201d He is currently incarcerated at the state prison in Vacaville.<\/p>\n

\u201cHow much more does the prosecution need in order to do the right thing here?\u201d asked the public defender, Brendon Woods. He added that Tran\u2019s \u201cdishonesty and racism have permanently tainted this case.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope the community is paying attention to how this District Attorney\u2019s Office is handling this and other cases,\u201d Woods said.<\/p>\n

Attempts to reach Tran\u2019s attorney were not immediately successful Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The allegations in the Buggs case mark the latest fallout of felony perjury and bribery charges filed against Tran in 2023, which claim the detective paid off and coerced a witness in a 2011 murder case. Convictions against the two men in that case \u2014 both of whom are Black \u2014 were later quietly overturned by the Alameda County District Attorney\u2019s Office, after a key witness claimed she received thousands of dollars from Tran to lie on the stand.<\/p>\n

Stevens ultimately found that the sheer amount of alleged misconduct by Tran \u2014 all of which had transpired before the jury rendered their verdict in 2015 \u2014 left him no choice but to order a new trial.<\/p>\n

To toss the conviction, the judge said in a court filing that he only needed to find it was \u201cmore likely than not\u201d that at least one juror would have changed their mind, had they known about the growing number of misconduct allegations against Tran.<\/p>\n

The judge cited the same allegations at the heart of Tran\u2019s charges. His case stems from the 2011 murder of 23-year-old Charles Butler Jr., who was fatally shot while arguing over a parking spot near his North Oakland home.<\/p>\n

Convictions against two men \u2014 Giovonte Douglas and Cartier Hunter<\/a> \u2014 were upended<\/a> when an unhoused woman told investigators that she allegedly received thousands of dollars from Tran to testify against the men. The payments included a $5,000 cash payment that Tran allegedly made approximately 30 minutes after the woman finished testifying at Douglas and Hunter\u2019s 2016 murder trial, according to court testimony.<\/p>\n

Stevens also cited more allegations in two other homicide cases, during which Tran allegedly again paid off witnesses to testify and use statements he fed to them.<\/p>\n

They include the murder investigations into Ezell Edwards and Anthony Hoskins<\/a>, who were convicted in the 2012 killing of Brandon McDaniel over an alleged federal income tax fraud scheme. In that case, a man claimed Tran offered him money in exchange for favorable testimony, according to Stevens\u2019 ruling.<\/p>\n

Stevens also referenced the prosecution of Darius Esters, who was jailed in the 2012 killing of Tattiaunn Turner<\/a> outside an East Oakland store. Another witness said she received money from Tran and felt \u201cpressured and bribed\u201d to falsely blame Esters for the killing, Stevens ruling said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile any one statement, standing alone, might not tip the balance, their cumulative force undermines the reliability of the verdict,\u201d Stevens wrote in his ruling.<\/p>\n

Tran\u2019s credibility took center stage during Buggs\u2019 trial in 2015<\/a>, when prosecutors and defense attorneys sparred over the detective\u2019s methods for identifying suspects in the case.<\/p>\n

Tran \u2014 who had been a homicide detective for just a year while investigating Young\u2019s death \u2014 originally obtained an arrest warrant for another man, after the only other individual in the room during the killing identified that person as the shooter. The detective\u2019s focus later shifted to Buggs<\/a> after receiving a tip from either an anonymous caller or confidential informant, court records show.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a case where the jurors were concerned about the accuracy of the identifications and the integrity of Tran\u2019s methods, evidence that Tran had allegedly engaged in misconduct in other investigations would likely have carried weight,\u201d Stevens wrote.<\/p>\n

The ruling comes as Tran\u2019s criminal case moves at a glacial pace.<\/p>\n

An Alameda County judge in June 2023 found that enough evidence existed for the case to go before a jury. However, no trail date has been set. And questions have swirled about the case\u2019s future under District Attorney Ursula Jones Dickson \u2014 herself a former judge who has worked to unwind the legacy<\/a> of her recalled predecessor, Pamela Price.<\/p>\n

Often, that work has centered on ending the prosecutions of law enforcement officers, which had been a pillar of Price\u2019s tenure. Jones Dickson has dismissed criminal cases against several law enforcement officers<\/a> charged in at least two deaths at the Santa Rita Jail<\/a>. Just this week, Jones Dickson\u2019s office also asked a judge to dismiss the manslaughter case<\/a> against Jason Fletcher in the 2020 shooting death of Steven Taylor.<\/p>\n

The Alameda County District Attorney\u2019s Office did not respond to a request by this news outlet for comment on Stevens\u2019 rulings.<\/p>\n

Jakob Rodgers is a senior breaking news reporter. Call, text or send him an encrypted message via Signal at 510-390-2351, or email him at jrodgers@bayareanewsgroup.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OAKLAND \u2014 An Alameda County judge this month overturned another decade-old murder conviction that was secured with the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":90443,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[7,8,1312,723,138,181,100,143,145,144],"class_list":{"0":"post-90442","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oakland","8":"tag-california","9":"tag-california-news","10":"tag-courts","11":"tag-crime","12":"tag-crime-and-public-safety","13":"tag-latest-headlines","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-oakland","16":"tag-oakland-headlines","17":"tag-oakland-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90442"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90442\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/90443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}