A prosecutor has gone to the Florida Supreme Court in a high-profile murder case stemming from the fatal shooting of an Orlando police officer, arguing that evidence against the defendant is being improperly excluded.

The issue centers of whether evidence about defendant Markeith Loyd murdering another woman should be allowed into his upcoming trial in the shooting death of Orlando Police Lt. Debra Clayton. Clayton was shot in January 2017 after Loyd was spotted in a Walmart store while facing an arrest warrant in the murder of Sade Dixon, who had been pregnant with his child.

Prosecutor Kenneth Nunnelley filed a 46-page petition at the Supreme Court last week, after the Fifth District Court of Appeal upheld a circuit judge's decision to block evidence in the Clayton case of Loyd's murder of Dixon. That evidence includes a finding by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement that the same Smith & Wesson .40-caliber firearm was used in both shootings, according to the filing.