The conviction of a Lake Charles man who fatally shot a homeless man in 2021 will stand.

Steven Dwayne Rigmaiden was found guilty of second-degree murder by an unanimous jury in June 2023 for shooting Ezekiel Joubert on June 19, 2021, from his car near Albert and Elder streets. Joubert’s body was later discovered on the side of the road.

Lake Charles Police Det. Russell Mixon, who responded to three 911 calls about gunshots heard in the area, testified that he stopped his vehicle just short of the intersection that night because a bag was sitting in the middle of Albert Street. He then exited his vehicle and observed individuals on the side of the road pointing toward the intersection. He said he would later find Joubert “motionless, unresponsive and in a fixed position.”

Video from Mixon’s body camera shows bystanders telling Mixon to look for “a red Monte Carlo.”

Local resident Brett Joseph told jurors he was sitting on his Albert Street porch when Joubert was shot. He said Joubert was walking east on Elder Street when a car approached him. He said Joubert  — who was carrying a bag — approached the car “like he knew” the person in it.

Joseph testified he then heard multiple pops and saw the victim jump and run away from the car — which sped off heading north. He said the car was a red Chevrolet.

Lake Charles Police Officer Kristin Howell testified she processed the crime scene and retrieved two bullet casings. About six weeks after the shooting, she said she was part of a team who retrieved parts of a gun and live ammunition found in an adjacent field on an Interstate 10 service road. The recovered ammunition consisted of 9 millimeter Luger bullets, she said, the same type of shells recovered at the crime scene.

Det. Benjamin Randolph was able to retrieve video surveillance and discovered several clips that featured a red Chevrolet Monte Carlos in the area that night — near a community center minutes after the shooting and on Lake, Broad and Iris streets later that evening. A license plate reader revealed the video all featured the same car.

Calcasieu Parish Sheriff Deputy Joe Duhon, who was off-duty that night, told jurors he was eating at a Wendy’s fast-food restaurant that night when he received a BOLO (be on look out) for a red Monte Carlo. Immediately after, he saw the red Monte Carlo drive past him.

Duhon testified he then left Wendy’s, contacted the police department, followed the vehicle to an apartment complex on Iris Street, and watched as the car’s solo occupant entered an apartment. The driver was identified as Rigmaiden and the vehicle was registered to his mother.

Gunshot residue would later be confirmed on the driver’s side door.

Calcasieu Parish Coroner Dr. Terry Welke said Joubert sustained two gunshots that broke his ribs and injured both of his lungs.

Rigmaiden appealed his conviction to the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeal, stating the prosecution’s case was based solely on circumstantial evidence. Rigmaiden claims the state failed to prove he was the shooter simply because video shows him driving the car.

The court denied Rigmaiden’s claim, stating he “fails to put forth an alternative hypothesis that explains how someone other than him fired shots from the driver’s window, especially considering that he was clearly driving the vehicle less than ten minutes before the shooting.

“In our view, only one hypothesis of innocence is presented: that at some point between Rigmaiden driving away from the Dollar General and the shooting, someone else took his car, used it to commit the murder, then gave the car back to him,” the panel wrote. “But this is the same hypothesis of innocence that the jury rejected at trial.”