Man charged with killing his mother presents closing argument at trial

DaTwan Smith’s brother said the defendant also fired four shots at him.

By PAULA REED WARD
TribLive

Two days before police say a McKeesport man fatally shot his mother and her friend last year in Homestead, he targeted his brother with violence, according to court testimony Monday.

DaTwan Smith, the final prosecution witness in John Malcolm Smith IV’s double homicide trial, told jurors his brother shot at him four times.

He said the shooting happened when he took his mother, Antoinette Porterfield, to her house to retrieve some belongings after John Smith beat her up.

DaTwan Smith testified that as soon as his brother saw him, John Smith started shooting.

“I got out of there,” he said. “I ran to the car.”

DaTwan Smith drove around the corner and called his mom. He told her he’d pull up in front of the house, and that she had to run to the car.

“And that’s exactly what happened,” he told jurors.

Later that night, DaTwan Smith said, his brother texted him, taunting him about that day’s events.

“‘He’s a runner,’” John Smith wrote. “‘He’s a track star.’” DaTwan Smith texted back, “gotta do what you gotta do sometimes.”

The trial took an odd turn when John Smith, 26, who is representing himself, cross-examined his own brother. He began by asking his brother if he saw him with a gun that day.

“You had to shoot at me with something,” DaTwan Smith responded. “I saw you with a firearm.”

“You allege the defendant opened fire on you?” John Smith asked.

“Yeah, you did,” his brother said.

Both sides rested their cases Monday in a trial that began Sept. 30.

Accused killer addresses jury

During closing arguments, John Smith repeatedly thanked Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Jennifer Satler and jurors for respecting him during the trial “and not making him feel less than.”

Smith repeatedly apologized for losing track of the point he was trying to make. He spoke for 20 minutes, urging the jury to find him not guilty.

“Most of the evidence you’ve heard was evidence I was involved in other conduct I’m not on trial for,” Smith said. “Evidence of other crimes is designed to distract you.

“You are here to judge whether I am guilty of events for Aug. 13, 2024.”

On that day, police say, Smith, 26, went to his mother’s home on West 15th Avenue around 4 p.m. and killed her and her friend, John West, 54.

Neighbors placed Smith at the scene that day, and one witness said she saw him fleeing the area after the shooting with a “deranged look” on his face.

Smith was arrested the next day.

He told police he couldn’t have committed the crime because he was at work, but the investigation revealed that Smith had been fired the morning of the shooting, said Allegheny County Deputy District Attorney Ryan Kiray.

‘I’m not going to jail’

Throughout the trial, Kiray presented a number of witnesses to recount the violent relationship John Smith had with his mother.

DaTwan Smith characterized the relationship as “rocky.”

“It gradually got worse,” he said.

DaTwan Smith testified he confronted his brother about allegations he had previously assaulted their mother.

“He never denied doing it,” DaTwan Smith told the jury. “He tried justifying it — ‘how bad of a mom she was, (that) she kind of deserved it.’” Then, in the days leading up to the double homicide, he said John Smith had beaten his mother so badly that she was hospitalized.

DaTwan Smith said he visited her in the hospital. Her face was swollen and cut all over.

When he spoke to his brother after that attack, he testified, John Smith said, “‘I’m not going to jail.’” He knew their mother had reported the attack to police, DaTwan Smith told the jury.

DaTwan Smith said he drove his mom to her house on Aug. 11, 2024, to retrieve some of her belongings. The police met them at the house and sent a dog through to ensure it was safe, DaTwan Smith said.

Porterfield then went inside, and the officers left.

DaTwan Smith was in the back yard keeping a lookout for his brother, which is when John Smith started shooting at him. he said.

Seeking firstdegree murder conviction

Standing behind a lectern in front of the bench, Smith told the jurors most of the testimony during the trial had no relevance to that day’s shooting.

“I had no intentions of harming anyone,” Smith said. “What else do I gotta do to prove my innocence?”

None of the prosecution witnesses, Smith said, testified they saw him enter his mom’s house that day.

But Kiray countered that in his closing argument.

“What they said was that they did not see him inside the residence that day,” Kiray said. “That’s very different.”

Several neighbors testified they saw John Smith on his mom’s street that day, lurking near the stop sign by her home, Kiray said.

Kiray urged the jurors to consider Smith’s “overt hostility toward her and absolute and utter contempt for her” and find him guilty of first-degree murder. Smith had repeatedly assaulted his mom and threatened her, Kiray said.

“Nothing sparked the defendant’s emotions and anger quite like Antoinette Porterfield,” the prosecutor said.

Kiray acknowledged the prosecution’s case is built on circumstantial evidence. But, he continued, “we’re talking about the collective weight of the evidence.”

Kiray said the jurors should consider the most subtle but damning evidence.

West was shot just one time in the head.

“But Antoinette Porterfield — the one he really had a problem with — was shot again and again and again.

“The ultimate manifestation of his anger and contempt.”

The jury began deliberating late in the afternoon before being dismissed for the day.

Deliberations will resume today.