I-10 shooting suspect freed 'to go home,' 'be with kids'

PHOENIX — In the seven months that Leslie Allen Merritt Jr. has spent in custody, his message to those who accused him of a string of Interstate 10 shootings hasn't wavered.

​Merritt, the lone suspect in a high-profile, Phoenix-area freeway-shooter case, was beaming as he walked out of jail at 6 p.m. MST Tuesday, hours after a judge ordered his release.

"I told you guys when I first got arrested I didn't do it. I'm telling you now that I'm going home I didn't do it," he told the swarm of reporters who rushed him after he emerged Tuesday evening from jail. "Right now I just want to go home and be with my kids."

Dressed in a black T-shirt and jeans, Merritt, 21, of Glendale, Ariz., hugged and chatted briefly with his lawyers immediately after stepping outside. None of the supporters who regularly attend his hearings was waiting outside although one woman was seen earlier talking to his lawyers.

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Merritt’s defense attorney, Jason Lamm, whisked him away after giving a few statements to the media.

The state's case against Merritt, accused in a series of shootings Aug. 27 to Sept. 10 along Interstate 10 and Arizona 202 here, appeared to have been thrown into turmoil after a ruling in a Tuesday morning hearing from Judge Warren Granville of Maricopa County Superior Court. The judge acted to modify Merritt's release conditions after a defense motion called into question ballistics evidence that prosecutors say links Merritt to the crimes.

Granville found that a “material fact” was not presented earlier in the case. Granville ordered Merritt's bond be reduced to zero from $150,000 but required Merritt to wear an electronic monitor while on pretrial release.

Merritt’s release doesn’t bring an end to his case. As of Tuesday, he still faces 15 felony charges, including drive-by shooting and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

No one else has been arrested in connection with the shootings.

At the hearing, Maricopa County prosecutor Edward Leiter acknowledged that the motion in part was based on findings of a ballistics expert the state hired. Leiter did not explicitly object to Merritt’s release and said he would defer to Granville’s decision.

The defense’s motion to modify release conditions was sealed from public viewing although both prosecuting and defense lawyers alluded to its contents in open court. Legal experts say it’s too soon to predict whether a case dismissal would follow, but they acknowledged that Granville’s move was dramatic.

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The ruling signals an erosion in the judge’s confidence in the state’s case, said Terry Goddard, a former Arizona attorney general.

“It’s not definitive, and it’s not determinate. But it certainly shows that in the judge’s opinion it’s not as strong of a case as it appeared when the defendant was arraigned initially,” he said.

Defense lawyer Jason Lamm offered a blunt assessment of how a recent independent ballistics analysis had affected his client’s case.

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“There’s no evidence against him,” Lamm told Granville. “He’s no more the I-10 shooter than you are.”

The case against Merritt hinges on ballistics evidence. In the Sept. 18 announcement of his arrest, Col. Frank Milstead, who is the Arizona Department of Public Safety director, said lab results tied Merritt's gun to four of the 11 incidents.

Merritt's alibis neither exonerate nor definitively place him at the scenes of any of the shootings.

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Public records released last month shed light on investigative details that promised to complicate the state's case. Notably, they showed how Merritt's gun was under lock and key at a pawn shop by the evening of Aug. 30, when one of the victims first noticed something was amiss with his tire. A bullet later was found inside it.

State public safety officials later said this was a result of a "run-flat" tire, explaining that its durability would make it possible for the shooting to have occurred days earlier. They adjusted their timeline accordingly, saying that what was believed to be the last shooting was actually the first, occurring Aug. 27.

However, witness interviews gave Merritt's lawyers a ready-made defense. The victim said he was sure he had no issues with his tire when he parked it at the airport Aug. 27. And a service technician said the car's pressure warning would have activated “within a mile” of where the puncture occurred.

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It is unclear how Tuesday’s events will affect the $10 million wrongful-arrest claim Merritt filed against Arizona officials. Lawyers, who are barred from speaking publicly about the case, did not elaborate in court on details of the independent ballistics analysis.

“The guy’s been in a box for seven months, 23 hours a day,” Lamm said. “Let’s let him go home, hug his family, take a hot shower, get to bed. … This isn’t over yet.”

Follow Megan Cassidy on Twitter: @meganrcassidy