Former police officer charged in Houston drug raid deaths awaits jury verdict

HOUSTON– A jury began deliberating Tuesday on the fate of a former Houston police officer accused of being responsible for the 2019 deaths of a couple during a raid that led to an investigation that revealed systematic corruption problems within the police department's drug enforcement unit.

Gerald Goines is accused of double murder of Dennis Tuttle (59) and his 58-year-old wife Rhogena Nicholas in January 2019. Goines has pleaded not guilty.

The couple was shot and killed along with their dog after officers entered their home with a no-knock search warrant, and officers were not required to announce themselves before entering.

Jurors could also convict Goines of the lesser offense of tampering with government records. He is accused of forging the search warrant used to justify the raid on the couple's home.

During closing arguments in a trial that began Sept. 9, prosecutors told jurors that Goines, 59, fabricated a confidential informant and manipulated people to get a search warrant for the couple's home that falsely portrayed them as dangerous drug dealers.

Prosecutor Keaton Forcht told jurors that everything that happened in the house, including the couple's deaths and the officers' injuries, “came directly from the forged search warrant and Goines' lies.” During the raid, four officers were shot and wounded, and a fifth was injured.

“The deaths of Rhogena Nicholas and Dennis Tuttle are a grave injustice,” said Forcht of the Harris County District Attorney’s Office.

Goines' lawyers admitted that the ex-cop lied to get the search warrant, but tried to downplay the impact of his false statements. They said Nicholas and Tuttle were responsible for their own deaths.

Tuttle and Nicholas “did not die because there was an invalid warrant and officers entered their home,” but because they disobeyed officers' orders and fired at them, putting the officers' lives in danger, said George Secrest, one of Goines' attorneys.

“You can hate Gerald… but he is not guilty of murder,” Secrest said.

Nicole DeBorde, another attorney for Goines, told jurors that Tuttle's mental health history may have played a role in the shooting. She also said there was evidence the couple were armed and dangerous drug dealers.

But prosecutor Tanisha Manning told jurors that Tuttle was a war veteran with a long medical history and had every right to fire his weapon and defend his home against people who broke through his door.

Manning said prosecutors would not place blame on other officers in the house who were unaware of the forged search warrant and therefore had a right to defend themselves.

“The only person responsible for that hail of bullets was Gerald Goines,” Manning said.

Investigators said they found only small amounts of marijuana and cocaine in the house.

During the trial, Jeff Wolf, a Texas Ranger who investigated the shooting, testified that officers fired first when they entered the house and shot the couple's dog. Wolf said the gunshots and Nicholas' screams likely caused Tuttle to come out of his bedroom and open fire on the officers.

Goines' lawyers said the officers identified themselves before entering the home, but Wolf testified the couple may never have found out before the shots were fired.

Goines' lawyers argued during the trial that it was Tuttle, not the police officers, who shot another person first.

An officer involved in the raid and the judge who approved the search warrant testified that the raid would never have taken place if they had known that Goines had lied to get the search warrant.

If convicted of murder, Goines faces a life sentence in prison.

The investigation into the drug raid also revealed allegations of systematic corruption.

A dozen drug agents who conducted the raid, including Goines, were later charged in a corruption investigation. In June, a judge dismissed the charges against some of them.

Since the raid, prosecutors have reviewed thousands of cases handled by the drug agency.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has overturned at least 22 convictions related to Goines, who was also charged in federal court.

Another Goines-related case that remains under scrutiny is the 2004 arrest of George Floyd in Houston on drug charges. His death at the hands of a Minnesota police officer in 2020 sparked a national reckoning over racism in policing. A Texas committee in 2022 rejected a request to grant Floyd a posthumous pardon for his drug conviction stemming from his arrest by Goines.

The families of Tuttle and Nicholas have filed civil rights lawsuits against Goines and 12 other officers involved in the raid, as well as the city of Houston, with a trial scheduled for November.

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