Javier Ambler death trial: Defense attorney has medical emergency in court

Published February 27, 2024 7:07pm CST

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Javier Ambler death trial day 2

It was a dramatic day in court during trial for two former Williamson County deputies charged with manslaughter. But it had nothing to do with what was said on the witness stand, the defense attorney had a medical emergency right in the middle of testimony.

WILLIAMSON COUNTY, Texas - About 30 minutes into day two of former Williamson County Sheriff's deputies James Johnson and Zachary Camden's trial, one of their defense attorneys faced a medical emergency.

Both Johnson and Camden are on trial for manslaughter for the 2019 in custody death of Javier Ambler.

Defense attorney Doug O'Connell left the courtroom due to a medical emergency. As a result, Judge Karen Sage halted court proceedings.

ATCEMS arrived at the courthouse and after about 45 minutes, a member of O'Connell's staff announced that everything was all good. The trial continued without O’Connell, but he is expected to be back on Wednesday.

Defense attorney Ken Ervin motioned for a mistrial Tuesday afternoon out of the presence of the jury due to a lack of transparency from the state over a piece of evidence.

He claims the state failed to submit the evidence in advance of clearer video from the incident modified by Ron Baldwin, a digital evidence coordinator with the Williamson County DA’s Office. He says this breaks court rules, but the state claims they did not have knowledge of said evidence until the witness took the stand and did not ask him to create it.

The judge denied it at first, but said it would be taken up properly on Wednesday morning.

Ken Ervin, defense: "For the record, moving for mistrial with additional grounds of prejudice to the defense, in sufficient time to properly review this video, send it to experts. See what else we can do with this."
Holly Taylor, state: "Your honor, the state, we're not objecting to some type of continuance if that would benefit the defense in this instance."
Judge Karen Sage: "Why don't I hold off on that until you just look at the video as it is now, and then tomorrow morning we can address that issue with respect to whether that would be helpful or useful or necessary in this case."
Holly Taylor, state: "And the state is sensitive also to Mr. O'Connell's situation."
Judge Karen Sage: "Yes. So if we need it, if we need more time, you can take the video home tonight and if you need more time, we can. Let's address that tomorrow morning. I'll leave that. I'll leave that open at this point."

Photos and data logs of Camden's taser were presented to the jury showing the day and time of the incident. It reveals Camden deployed his taser twice in the span of about a minute.

APD Sgt. Billy Park was the one who reviewed the data in 2019. He told the jury the two back-to-back tase deployments did not seem out of the ordinary to him.

Later, Austin Travis County EMS Medic Jacob Palmer said on the witness stand that the taser lines caused issues for him and other medics on scene trying to help Ambler in 2019.

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When asked by the defense if there were any other obvious injuries to Ambler’s body besides the taser marks, Palmer said there was a large wound to Ambler's leg that was a sign of congestive heart failure. He says the wound gave insight to him about Ambler’s underlying health condition.

He also added that there was no other proof of injuries by an officer on Ambler’s body besides the taser marks.

The entire encounter in 2019 was caught on camera by production crews filming for a police reality show called Live PD. Medic Palmer recalled being told on scene that he was not allowed to interview the crews for information. Sgt. Parks also mentioned in his testimony that he tried to subpoena the footage, but was unsuccessful.

The trial continues Wednesday morning.