TOPEKA, Kan. (WIBW) – The Kansas Supreme Court on Friday announced in a unanimous decision that it has upheld the first-degree murder conviction of a man in connection with a 2022 homicide in the Aggieville district of Manhattan.
Kansas Supreme Court officials said Tremelle Montgomery’s convictions in connection with first-degree premeditated murder, three counts of attempted first-degree murder, and three counts of aggravated assault were upheld.
According to a news release, Kansas Supreme Court Justice Caleb Stegall, “writing for a unanimous Court, assumed the Riley County District Court erred by not giving a jury instruction for voluntary manslaughter based on imperfect self-defense, but such error was harmless.”
The Kansas Supreme Court on Friday announced it has upheld the murder conviction of Tremelle Montgomery, 23, in a 2022 homicide in Manhattan.(Submitted)
The Kansas Supreme Court also held that the district court did not err by declining to give a self-defense instruction pursuant to state statute, “because no evidence showed a reasonable person would have perceived the use of deadly force as necessary.”
The Kansas Supreme Court then found that the record, when viewed in its totality, “would allow a rational fact-finder to find that Montgomery committed attempted first-degree murder.”
Consequently, the Kansas Supreme Court held that “the State properly charged Montgomery with attempted first-degree murder.”
The Kansas Supreme Court then found that the district court committed judicial comment error by telling a juror that the maximum sentence in Montgomery’s case could be life in prison.
However, the Kansas Supreme Court found this comment was immediately properly addressed and the error was “harmless.”
Having assumed one error and found another, the Kansas Supreme Court determined that — even considering those errors together — their cumulative impact on Montgomery’s trial was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.
In the incident for which Montgomery was convicted, Joshua J. Wardi, 21, of Fort Riley, was shot around 12:30 a.m. on Feb. 5, 2022, outside a bar near 12th and Moro streets in Manhattan.
Wardi, who was in the U.S. Army and stationed at nearby Fort Riley, was pronounced dead at the scene.
One Riley County police officer responding to the scene rendered aid to Ward while two other officers chased Montgomery, officials said.
As Montgomery, now 23, turned a corner onto 12th Street, officials said, he was shot in the leg by a Riley County police officer who fired two rounds. Montgomery then stopped on 12th Street midway between Moro and Laramie streets.
After he was wounded, Montgomery was transported to Ascension Via Christi Hospital in Manhattan before being transferred to a Topeka hospital.
Montgomery was later booked into the Riley County Jail, where bond was set for $1.5 million.
He was sentenced to prison on Oct. 24, 2023. and is an inmate at the El Dorado Correctional Facility.
Additional details weren’t immediately available.
Check wibw.com later for more information as it becomes available.
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