Trio of trials top first week of jury docket

The Monday trial of a man suspected of shooting into an occupied mobile home in 2021 will lead off Comanche County’s third felony docket of the year.

Comanche County has scheduled four four-week dockets this year to address a backlog of cases.

Christopher Adam East, a.k.a. “D-Town,” “Dallas,” and/or “D-Boy,” 33, will begin trial before Chief District Judge Grant Sheperd for felony discharging a firearm into a dwelling, use of a vehicle in the discharge of a weapon, possession of a firearm after two former felony convictions, as well as a misdemeanor count of reckless conduct with a firearm, records indicate.

If found guilty, Adams faces between four years to life in prison for the use of a vehicle charge due to his two prior felony convictions.

Events began around 10:45 p.m. Feb. 1 when East went into EZ-Go, 3003 E. Gore, on Feb. 1, 2021, and asked an employee about a man he’d heard had been looking for him. The witness said East pulled a handgun from the pocket of his hoodie and said “he had something” for the man before getting into a silver SUV and leaving, according to the probable cause affidavit.

Minutes later, the silver SUV drove past a mobile home at 601 NE Flower Mound Road and gunshots were fired into the structure and vehicle parked outside, the affidavit states. The man the witness said East had been asking for as well as a woman and child were inside. The man said he saw East, known to him as “Ghost,” drive by a second time. No one was injured from the gunfire.

Investigators learned that on the day of the shooting, East was driving his girlfriend’s silver SUV, a Nissan Rogue.

An arrest warrant was issued for East on Feb. 11, 2021, and he was taken into custody and had his initial court appearance Dec. 17, 2021. After getting his bond lowered from $100,000 to $75,000, he was freed on Jan. 24, 2022, records indicate.

East was taken back into custody on May 12, 2023, after he was charged in a separate case with felony charges of endangering others while eluding police, driving under the influence — great bodily injury, causing a wreck without a valid driver’s license, and misdemeanor counts of driving under the influence of alcohol, transporting an open container and possession of marijuana, records indicate.

For these charges, East is scheduled to stand trial during the November jury trial docket.

East has prior convictions in Texas: June 2009, Henderson County, burglary of habitation; and October 2009, Rusk County, burglary of habitation, according to records.

First-degree rape trial

Also on Monday, District Judge Jay Walker will preside over the trial of Anthony Dimitri Turner, 35, of Lawton, for felony charges of first-degree rape, second-degree rape, lewd or indecent acts to a child under 16 and sexual battery.

Turner is accused of raping three teen runaways in October 2021.

The girls told police Turner picked them up at a convenience store and gave them a ride to a friend’s house before taking them back to his house at 1610 NW Ferris and then to a liquor store before returning, according to the probable cause affidavit. He is accused of getting one of the girls drunk and having sex with her twice. A 17-year-old girl said she’d become drunk and claimed Turner touched her inappropriately while she was vomiting.

The youngest teen, 14, told investigators a similar story of being given alcohol and said Turner had sex with her on the couch despite her protests to stop. She said he didn’t listen and “continued to rape her,” the affidavit states.

After making his initial court appearance on Oct. 22, 2021, Turner has been free on $35,000 bond since March, 3, 2022, records indicate.

Assault and battery trial

On Wednesday, Michael Cypert, 50, will begin trial in Walker’s courtroom for two felony charges of assault and battery on a corrections officer, records indicate. Due to two prior felony convictions, he faces up to 10 years in prison per count if convicted.

Cypert is accused of assaulting one detention officer in June 2022, punching him repeatedly in the face and head, according to the probable cause affidavit. He is accused of punching a female detention officer in the head and body about 15 minutes later before being stopped.

In January 2023, a Comanche County jury found Cypert guilty of assaulting and injuring another corrections officer at Lawton Correctional Facility, 8607 SE Flower Mound Road. He was sentenced to serve four years in prison.

Cypert has been serving a 30-year sentence at the Lawton prison for a second-degree murder conviction from Tulsa County from April 2012. Records indicate he also has an August 1999 conviction in Arkansas for distribution of narcotics with intent to distribute.