Friend of Fresno County double murder defendant asked him: What happened?
A friend of accused killer Gary Perry testified Wednesday that he got vague answers when he asked him what happened to their friends, Scott Alex Gaffney and Brennen Julian Fairhead.
Gaffney and Fairhead, both 21-years-old, were shot multiple times in the Woodward Lake neighborhood on Dec. 14, 2017. Their bodies were found by neighbors who were startled by a volley of gunshots.
Perry, 26, is on trial for their murders, and faces life in prison without the possibility of parole if found guilty.
Perry’s friend Adrian Salazar met with him soon after the killings and was shocked to find out his friends were dead. “I asked him what happened,” Salazar testified. “And he gave me the run around.”
Then he saw Perry being arrested by police. Detectives questioned Salazar too. They showed him a video taken from a restaurant near the scene of the murders. The person in the video was wearing a puffy jacket with fur in the hood, jeans and bright red sneakers.
Witnesses told police the man acted very anxious when he walked in and asked to use the restroom. “They asked me if that was Gary Perry and I said yes,” Salazar said.
Police have accused Perry of shooting and killing his two friends after completing a drug deal near Fresno State on the night of Dec. 14. After the transaction was done, Perry, Fairhead, Gaffney and the person who set up the deal, Michael Rackney, drove back to the Woodward Lake area to drop Rackney off, according to the prosecution.
Rackney testified on Tuesday that as he was getting out of Fairhead’s Honda, Perry began shooting, striking Fairhead first, then Gaffney and finally trying to shoot him.
He managed to escape without getting shot, he said during his testimony.
Fresno detective Bart Ledbetter testified that Perry used a Glock 26 with an illegal 33-round magazine to shoot the two men.
The victims were shot multiple times and were dead by the time neighbors ran to check on them.
Shawn Autry, a resident who lives on Grouse Run, is an emergency room nurse who quickly assessed the situation.
“I approached one victim who was in the middle of the road and who appeared to have head trauma,” Autry said. “There was no pulse. I then went to the other gentleman on the sidewalk and he had two gsw’s (gun shot wounds) to his chest. I felt for a pulse and there was none.”
The trial resumes on Monday in Department 50.
