Victim’s mother doubts justice as admitted killer’s case dismissed

INDIANAPOLIS — When D’Lon Edwards, 34, lay mortally wounded on the morning of December 20, 2021, near Lawndale Avenue and Diamond Lane on the northwest side, he called 911 for help.

“I’ve been shot. Please don’t let me die,” he told the emergency dispatch operator. “She took off in my car. Female, black.”

Minutes later, about the time Edwards was being pronounced dead, IMPD officers found his car in a driveway a block away at a house where Chaznee Mockabee was inside.

Chyrisse Edwards said that’s when the original homicide detective on the case began his investigation.

”I’m guessing they started looking into the forensics and interviewing individuals and trying to find out what happened at the time and what was the chain of events.”

Though witnesses were questioned, DNA and a fingerprint collected, the gun that fired the fatal shot found in the house where Edwards’ car was parked, Chyrisse said all communications with the detective on her son’s case went quiet.

”I wasn’t getting any return calls so I had to reach out to his superior to try to get an answer to some of the questions that I had regarding the investigation.”

IMPD homicide supervisors determined the original detective had conducted a haphazard investigation, a new detective was assigned to the case and 18 months later charges were filed against Mockabee giving Chyrisse hope that her son’s killer would face justice.

”You got the DNA. You got several witnesses. Multiple witnesses. You got the forensics. What is there left to do but give a guilty verdict?”

But when Mockabee went to trial last month, witnesses disappeared, the prosecutor declined to call the original detective to the stand and Mockabee told jurors that she killed Edwards in self-defense.

”I thought it was full of lies,” said Chyrisse. “I thought it was a made-up story, nothing that had anything to do with my son’s character at all, who he was nor what he stood for, and it was just a clown show.”

Monday, the Marion County Prosecutors Office filed a Motion to Dismiss the charges against Mockabee, one week before a new jury was to be impaneled, citing, “Upon speaking to jurors after the trial, one juror held out for a verdict to the lesser included charge of voluntary manslaughter while the remaining jurors would have returned a not guilty verdict,” and, “the Defendant testified at trial alleging self-defense. Upon speaking with the jurors, they appeared receptive to the Defendant’s testimony,” and, “the original homicide detective assigned to this case became unavailable after the homicide and has since left IMPD,” and, “the State believes, after the hung jury, that the State would not be able to overcome the deficiencies from the initial investigation at a subsequent trial.”

Chyrisse was visiting her son’s grave at Crown Hill Cemetery to gather her thoughts regarding the prosecutor’s decision.

”He didn’t think he could win. Sad. You had a case that you had enough that you could submit the murder charges for, but you didn’t think you could win after a hung jury? I feel extremely let down,” she said. ”I absolutely did not get the answer I was looking for. She testified on the stand to pulling the trigger, shooting him, I can’t say murder because she didn’t get convicted of it, but pulling a gun, causing the fatal wounds to him and to find that the prosecution, even though it was a mistrial, I still had hope that a second jury might see things differently.”

Last year, the Marion County Prosecutor’s Office claimed a 94% conviction rate on the murder cases it chose to take to trial.

The killing of D’Lon Edwards would not be one of those successful cases this year, though the murder charge dismissal leaves the option of refiling the original counts or a lesser count open.