Jury deliberates without reaching a verdict in murder case

A Lake County jury deliberated for a close to three hours Thursday without reaching a verdict in the James Webb murder trial.

Circuit Judge John Phillips told the jurors to go home about 10 p.m. and said they would resume deliberating Friday morning.

Webb, 25, of Round Lake, is accused of killing Cydric Jones of Waukegan on Aug. 20, 2008.

Jones, 36, died of a single stab wound to the heart that Webb did not deny he inflicted when he testified in his own defense earlier Thursday.

Webb claimed he was terrified of Jones, whom he had seen harassing his co-worker over a $175 drug debt, and said that he had once seen Jones with a 9 mm pistol.

On the night of the murder, Webb said, he called Jones and said he and his co-worker wanted to buy $20 worth of crack cocaine and Jones demanded they also bring the money the co-worker owed.

Webb said he then recruited his cousin, who did not know he was going to buy drugs, to accompany him to the meeting with Jones at Brentwood and Golfview drives in Round Lake Beach.

Webb said he took a 5-inch steak knife along in case Jones got upset when the co-worker and the money he owed failed to appear at the meeting.

In his closing argument, Assistant State's Attorney James Newman told the jurors they should look critically at Webb's story and disregard his claim of self-defense.

Webb told his cousin he planned to "stick" Jones, Newman said, then congratulated himself for doing so afterward.

"This is not a case of self-defense," Newman said. "He planned out what he was going to do, announced his intention on the way there and then carried it out."

Webb said Jones became enraged when he learned that he would not be collecting the money he was owed, and refused to sell him the $20 worth of crack cocaine he had come to buy.

Jones punched him in the face, Webb said, so he swung the knife.

The knife went so far into Jones' chest that the blade broke off where it met the handle.

Jones ran from the scene and traveled a little more than two blocks before stopping to pound on a door and asking for help.

He pulled the knife blade out of his chest, collapsed and lived long enough to tell paramedics that "two white dudes set me up" before dying.

Defense attorney Kevin Malia asked the jury to find Webb not guilty because he was acting in self-defense or to consider convicting him of second-degree murder.

To find Webb guilty of second-degree murder, they would have to decide that Webb had acted with an unreasonable belief that he was justified in stabbing Jones, Malia told the jury.

Webb was genuinely terrified of Jones, Malia said, and was meeting with him only because his need for the cocaine was so great.

When Jones punched Webb, Malia argued, Webb remembered seeing Jones with the gun and considered that he may have been armed that night.

"He did what he believed he had to do," Malia said. "It is your job to decide if that belief was reasonable."