Lone survivor of Mattapan Massacre to testify

(NECN: Eileen Curran) - The lone survivor of the so-called Mattapan Massacre will be in a Boston courtroom Tuesday to tell a judge about his dramatic turnaround in testimony.

Marcus Hurd is now saying he can identify his shooter, a very different claim from just this past March, when he testified in the first trial of two men accused in the quadruple homicide.

“I wasn’t really trying to get a description of what the man looked like,” Hurd told the courtroom months ago.  “I was worried about getting to the hospital (because) I was shot in the head.”

Now, Hurd says he recognized Dwayne Moore in court as the man who shot him in the back of the head two years ago, permanently putting him in a wheelchair.

Moore and another man, Edward Washington, were tried in the case.

Five people were shot that night, four died including a two year old boy.

The jury acquitted Washington, but deadlocked on Moore.

Prosecutors want to include Hurd’s identification in Moore’s retrial.

Legal experts say it could help the case if the jury sees it as a positive identification, or it could backfire if they think Hurd was pressured into pointing the finger at Moore.

“What we don’t know is; when and how this came about and what extraneous influences there were,” said Moore’s attorney John Amabile. “These all bear on whether or not the purported identification is admissible at the time of trial.”

NECN legal analyst Randy Chapman said the benefit of Hurd’s new testimony could help or harm both sides.

“This particular piece of evidence is like a live grenade where the pin has been pulled,” said Chapman. “Each side has to decide how close they want to get to grenade before it goes off.”

The judge will hear from both sides at a Tuesday morning hearing.

Moore’s retrial is scheduled to begin October 11th.