At the request of prosecutors Thursday, a Kanawha County judge dismissed a gun charge against the man accused of killing a teenager on Charleston's East End last year.
William Ronald Pulliam, 62, of Charleston, had wanted to plead guilty to the felony charge of being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm. A plea hearing had been set for Thursday afternoon.
However, before the hearing could happen, Kanawha Circuit Judge Charles King signed an order prepared by prosecutors dismissing that gun charge.
Pulliam still faces charges of murder and use or presentment of a firearm during a felony in the November shooting death of 15-year-old James Harvey Means.
Means was shot twice in the abdomen with a .380-caliber revolver on Nov. 21 near the Dollar General on Washington Street East.
Charleston police say Pulliam showed no remorse after Means' death, admitted shooting him and said, "The way I look at it, that's another piece of trash off the street," a criminal complaint filed against Pulliam states.
A Kanawha grand jury returned a three-count indictment against Pulliam last month.
Pulliam faces similar charges in federal court over not being allowed to have a gun because of a 2013 domestic violence conviction.
During Pulliam's arraignment before King on Monday, his lawyer indicated that Pulliam wanted to admit to the one gun charge.
Thursday afternoon, after the charge his client had planned to admit to was dismissed, Pulliam's lawyer, Richard Holicker, explained his reasoning behind the plea attempt and said he was considering challenging King's dismissal order.
"Among the reasons we want to plead to the charge of prohibited person in possession of a firearm is to lessen the likelihood that the federal government will prosecute Mr. Pulliam on the same charge," Holicker told the Gazette-Mail. "As unusual as it may seem, we may consider challenging the dismissal order, which we have not yet seen."
If Pulliam is convicted of being a prohibited person in possession of a firearm - either by guilty plea or by a Kanawha jury - federal prosecutors would have to decide if they want to pursue their case against him.
There is no law prohibiting the federal government from prosecuting a defendant on charges they already have been convicted of in a state court, but Department of Justice policy requires prosecutors to seek permission from DOJ officials before doing so, according to Kanawha Prosecuting Attorney Charles Miller, a former U.S. Attorney for the state's Southern District.
Miller said Thursday afternoon that his office asked to dismiss the charge against Pulliam to avoid complications - with the federal case against Pulliam and at the trial on the murder charge. The trial is set for late August.
"We became a little concerned as to what a guilty plea might do to the federal case, and we initially thought a jury [in the in Kanawha Circuit Court trial] should know [Pulliam] wasn't lawfully allowed to possess a firearm," Miller said.
Trial rules in West Virginia prohibit using a defendant's prior convictions to impeach them, Miller said.
The federal indictment unsealed Feb. 7 alleges that Pulliam lied on federal forms to purchase the .380 revolver.
The indictment charges Pulliam with knowingly making a false statement and representation to the information required on the federal form and two counts of the unlawful transport of firearms. If convicted, he faces up to 10 years in federal prison.
He faces life in prison on the murder charge.
Pulliam said he shot Means in self defense, according to arguments made by his attorneys during a December preliminary hearing in Kanawha Magistrate Court.
"It don't look like self defense to us," Miller said Thursday.
Pulliam claims that Means showed him a BB gun after an argument.
Means did keep a BB gun in his waistband, Charleston Detective Chris Lioi testified during the December hearing. That was something the detective said he discovered during his investigation into Means' death. The BB gun was located in a bag belonging to a witness of the shooting, according to the detective.
Lioi said video footage from the shooting scene doesn't support Pulliam's self-defense claim. Means didn't have anything in his hands when he was shot, according to the detective.
Means was shot in the back and chest, Lioi previously said in court. The teen fell to the ground after the gunshot to his chest. When he got up, he turned to run away and was shot in the back, according to the detective.
After the shooting, Pulliam went to dinner at a female friend's home, according to the criminal complaint filed against him. That's where police say they found the gun allegedly used to kill Means.
Reach Kate White at kate.white@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1723 or follow @KateLWhite on Twitter.