"I never gave much thought about going from student to working for marijuana cultivation. Now I know I should have never gone that route."

"I never gave much thought about going from student to working for marijuana cultivation. Now, I know I should have never gone that route."

These are the words spoken by Eddie Lee when he took the stand last week. He is still testifying. A young man in his early 20s who stands accused of murder alongwith co-defendant Limmie Curry. Each is being tried separately.

The posts below are only two of the many I have written about this trial. There is no other media coverage of this case.

http://johnchiv.blogspot.com/2014/09/father-son-like-relationship-triumphed.html?m=1

http://johnchiv.blogspot.com/2014/09/eddie-lee-fell-in-love-with-this-area.html?m=1

Eddie has waited 4 and a half years in custody in Humboldt to tell his story. Throughout all the delays, Eddie has been polite, cooperative and well-mannered. Not what you expect from a typical Humboldt defendant.

In the other posts linked above, Eddie's attorney, Darryl Stallworth, summed up Eddie's testimony.  In this post is one day's testimony which describes in a bit more detail how Eddie went from student to working for someone cultivating marijuana.

It is the tale of a young kid from Oakland who got awards from Bill Clinton, dreamed of being a doctor, helped his girlfriend give up cocaine, ended up homeless, still took care of his responsibilities. It is the tale of a first time marijuana cultivator, a father figure to Eddie, who Eddie cared for, who ended up being murdered by someone Eddie wanted to help better his life.

Even though Eddie grew up in a rough neighborhood in Oakland, his biracial parents sent him and his siblings to private Catholic school because they prized education. Eddie was one of the third graders chosen for "I have a dream program" that financially contributed to part of his school and initial college education. He won several awards, including the Bill Clinton award in 1996.

Eddie and siblings were sheltered. Their parents were very careful who they associated with and they instilled work ethic and moral values in their children. Even in high school, he worked at the Berkley Lumber yard.

He promised his grandmother he would become a doctor. "I liked to help people." When she passed away, this promise became even more important. Eddie chose HSU over other. California State Universities. "When I came here, it was so peaceful, the opposite of Humboldt."

The first year, he lived in the dorms, his grades were good. Then he got an apartment near HSU the following year, failed a Botany class, his roomate couldn't cut it here and moved back to Oakland leaving Eddie to pay all the rent. He ended up couch surfing, his grades suffeted as a result. He was able to move into a house in Arcata. That house got broken into, his roomates moved back to LA and once again he was stuck with paying all the rent and lost that living situation. His grades further worsened, he was smoking marijuana at that time, did not feel then it impacted his grades. Now, he feels it had a negative impacton everything in his life.

He got arrested for possesion of marijuana he was trying to sell in Oregon to make money. He stopped going to school, was on probation and was academically disqualified from HSU.

This was in 2009 when he met his girlfrien Moriah Foster. She was using cocaine. They dated, moved in together, he ended up getting her to quit cocaine. They were both smoking marijuana. In 2009, he also met Curry, his sister's boyfriend.

Moriah and Eddie financially struggled. They were homeless, stayed in his car, briefly with her parents.Eddie was working at Pierson's and Moriah at Bayshore Inn. Through a friend of Moriah's, Jack Lamb, they met Billy Reid.

They were invited to trim. Billy instantly took a liking to Eddie. Very quickly seeing how hard Eddie worked and how grateful he was for the job, Billy grew to trust Eddie. He invited them to live and take care of the property and help him with his grow. He trusted Eddie so much that Eddie knew where Billy stashed his cash and put the money there.

Compared to making $400 every two weeks, Eddie started making $400 to $600 a week and eventually an extra $1,000 driving Billy Reid around. The following year, Billy was going to have a larger grow and split profits with Eddie and Moriah.

This all changed the night Eddie said Limmie unexpectedly shot Billy. Eddie had taken Limmie to the property to introduce him to Billy with th hopes of Limmie working and splitting the larger grow. He did this to help his sister's boyfriend and instead ended up in jail.