Witnesses withdraw stories
Two witnesses scheduled to testify this week in a 10-year-old murder case changed their story on the stand.
Andre Grier is one of three men accused in the death of Bianca Horton (one of the others was found guilty; the other pleaded guilty). Horton had planned to testify against Cortez Sims, who was charged in 2015 with killing a woman, injuring a rival gang member and paralyzing Horton’s daughter from gunshot wounds. But before Horton could testify, she was shot and killed.
Earlier this week, two state witnesses recanted previous statements about the Sims case given to detectives. In one, a former Athens Park Bloods gang member had told police Grier had made incriminating statements to him. In the other, a neighbor of Horton’s had told detectives she saw Grier and Horton talking at the apartment complex where Horton lived.
In the trial, though, the former gang member said he had no memory of making allegations against Grier, and the former neighbor said she had not been truthful when she told police she saw Grier and Horton talking.