Prosecutors say they'll retry a Miccosukee Indian on accusations that he drowned his sons.
By Associated Press
Published July 31, 2003
MIAMI - An appeals court overturned the murder conviction of a Miccosukee Indian who drove a sport utility vehicle carrying his sleeping sons into a canal, ruling Wednesday that his jury should never have heard his history of violence.
The 3rd District Court of Appeal ordered a new trial for Kirk Douglas Billie, who received a life sentence for second-degree murder after denying he knew the two boys were in their mother's SUV when he destroyed it to spite her.
The court said evidence about Billie's past became a key feature of the prosecution case and was "highly prejudicial."
The Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office will pursue a retrial in the 1997 deaths of 5-year-old Kurt and 3-year-old Keith Billie, said spokesman Ed Griffith.
Jurors were told that Billie beat his pregnant girlfriend with a broomstick; hit, slapped and kicked her on occasion; beat up the boys' grandmother; and threatened to kill himself and the children if he couldn't see them.
The appeals court will allow a new jury to hear only one story about Billie's past, when he held a hammer to the head of one of his sleeping sons. Billie said he did it to show his girlfriend, Sheila Tiger, how he felt when she left their children with her mother.
The Miccosukee Indian tribe opposed Billie's prosecution, insisting that its leaders dealt with the boys' deaths in a traditional way not requiring a murder trial.
Billie testified he drove Tiger's SUV into the canal to force her to stay home instead of cruising the reservation at night. He said he thought the boys were spending the night with their grandmother.
