By FARRAH JOHNSON
Tribune Staff Reporter
fjohnson@tribunemedia.net
A WOMAN yesterday testified that a man brutally beat her before holding a knife to her throat during a domestic dispute earlier this year.
Neikei Anderson, 28, was accused of harming a woman and damaging an iPhone 11 cellphone he had bought her.
He denied the allegations when he first appeared before Magistrate Samuel McKinney and the matter was adjourned to trial.
When his accuser testified yesterday, she told the court that on January 16 she was sitting at a table in her home with Anderson, who had helped her bring some bags inside her house. She said that evening another male friend knocked on her door and asked for her. She claimed that when the accused asked her who it was, she did not answer at first because he was “very aggressive” and she was afraid. She said when she did respond, she told the accused that he knew who it was.
“He kept on asking me while choking, punching and slapping me,” she said.
“He choked me at least four times. I passed out, but every time I came to, I was urinating (on) myself. It wasn’t a period where he stopped hitting and stomping me.”
The woman claimed Anderson also took a curtain rod and beat her on her thighs and the side of her face. She said during the attack, her nose was broken, and her left eardrum was ruptured. She also said he held a knife to her throat and used it to stab holes in her mattress.
“While he had the knife to my throat, he asked me if I wanted my daughter to grow up without a mother. It didn’t stop, it just kept going from one thing to the next. I just closed my eyes and prayed (because) I thought that was it. I kept asking him to stop (and) I yelled for help because I didn’t know what else to do.”
The complainant said Anderson also took her cellphone and all of the cash that was in her wallet before he left. She claimed that sometime later, she found out she was two months pregnant, but had suffered a miscarriage.
The accused was not represented by an attorney during the proceedings. When he cross-examined the complainant, he asked her if she remembered telling him she would pay him back “some funds” she owed him.
In response, she told Anderson that although he had sent $200 to her account, she paid him back “earlier that day.” She insisted that him taking the cash out of her wallet had “nothing to do with” the money she supposedly owed him.
Yesterday, Corporal Phylicita Gibson, the officer who interviewed Anderson in custody, also testified under oath.
She said when she interviewed Anderson on February 4, he told her he was at the complainant’s residence about to have sex when a male knocked on the bedroom window and called out the woman’s name. Cpl Gibson said the defendant told her he was going to the front door to see who the male was, but the complainant held him back. She said Anderson added that when he shoved her off, the woman fell but he did not look back to see if she got injured.
Cpl Gibson also said the accused denied getting a knife, threatening the complainant or damaging her cellphone. However, she said he claimed he did take the cellphone and $80 in cash because he was the one who had bought her the device, and the funds were the balance of $300 that he had given her earlier that day.
Cpl Gibson also said Anderson denied harming the woman and claimed she sustained her injuries when she got in a physical altercation with some girls at Fish Fry.
Anderson’s witnesses are scheduled to testify on June 24. He is also set to take the stand at that time.
Commenting has been disabled for this item.