A gun that prosecutors say is the weapon Dee Dee Moore used to shoot lottery winner Abraham Shakespeare was at the center of court proceedings in Moore's murder trial on Wednesday.
One of the witnesses who took the stand was Shar Krasniqi, who dated Moore in early 2009. They lived together in a mansion that Moore said she had purchased from Shakespeare. At one point, Moore gave Krasniqi a $70,000 Corvette.
"We went into a garage and we got out and pointed a car and said, 'That's your gift,'" he said.
Krasniqi also said Moore kept weapons inside the home, including one prosecutors held up in court, saying she kept that one in a safe. Shakespeare was shot twice before he was buried. Prosecutors said the gun was the weapon used in his murder.
However, crime lab analyst Yolanda Soto wasn't so sure.
"Because the bullets lack the identifying characteristics that must be present when attempting to make an identification, I could not identify them as having been fired from the same firearm," she said.
A confidential informant said Moore told her that was the gun used to shoot Shakespeare, but she said a drug dealer killed him. One of Shakespeare's friends testified that Moore told her a similar story about a drug dealer who demanded money but Shakespeare wouldn't turn over the cash.
"She said, 'I really need to tell you, Abraham is dead,'" she said.
That conversation took place on Jan. 26, just one day before Shakespeare's body was found.
Defense attempts to cast doubt on star witness
Earlier in the day, Moore's attorney tried to cast doubt on the prosecution's star witness Wednesday morning.
Since Friday, Greg Smith has been on the stand for the prosecution. He testified Moore enlisted him to conceal Shakespeare's whereabouts. Smith eventually put on a wire and became an informant for the Polk County Sheriff's Office.
Moore's attorney suggested Smith may have been trying to frame Moore. That's because the longtime friend of Shakespeare had borrowed more than $60,000 from the lottery winner and appeared to have trouble paying the money back.
Smith said he became an informant to find his friend.
"I did it because when they [detectives] explained to me what was going on and they said they had their suspicions that something like I told them," Smith said. "He had money. He could have went anywhere. Anybody was saying anything. I didn't know where he was, really didn't go into where he was. But the deal is when they came to me and they explained to me that there was an investigation going on. And I wouldn't get in no trouble and I could walk out of there right now, but they needed some help to find Abraham. I said I'd see what I could do. "
During the defense's cross examination, defense lawyers also pointed out the informant Greg Smith had spent time in prison and had been convicted of five felonies.
Defense lawyers also noted that in the taped phone conversations, it was the informant who did most of the talking, giving quite a bit of direction to the defendant Dee Dee Moore.
After three days of testimony, Smith was finally allowed to leave the stand at 10:30 a.m.