LR teen suspect faces adult trial
Judge told shooting charges too serious for juvenile court
A Little Rock teenager accused in a drive-by shooting that wounded a couple last summer, which police say was fallout from a feud between gangs, must stand trial as an adult, Pulaski County Circuit Judge Barry Sims has ruled.
After a 35-minute hearing Thursday, Sims ordered Glean Albert Finley III to stand trial as an adult not only on charges related to the June shooting that wounded Amanda Suzanne Odom, 20, and Curtland Odell Watson Jr., 21, but also on charges related to a stolen cellphone reportedly found on Finley in February 2017, and over accusations that he was involved in two home burglaries and 11 car break-ins in the Chenal area about two weeks before the shootings.
In the shooting in front of 4508 Montclair, Finley is charged with unlawful discharge of a firearm from a vehicle, aggravated assault and three counts of committing a terroristic act. Since two people were seriously injured, the charges carry a potential life sentence.
He’s also charged with two counts of residential burglary, 11 counts of breaking or entering and one count of theft by receiving.
Court records also show Finley faces three counts of theft by receiving in Faulkner County. According to arrest reports, Conway police, investigating several car burglaries at the University Park apartments at 1025 S. Donaghey — the same June night as the Chenal break-ins — obtained store surveillance video showing Finley and other men with him using some credit cards stolen from the vehicles.
Pulaski County deputy prosecutor Michael Wright argued that the serious nature of the shooting required that Finley, who turned 18 in custody, should be tried as an adult.
Finley has already spent almost two years under juvenile jurisdiction for gun and theft convictions and has since grown too old to be eligible for most juvenile rehabilitative services, the prosecutor said.
There was also testimony that the teen had regularly abused Xanax, even giving up marijuana in favor of the prescription anti-anxiety medication because it does not stay in the system as long as marijuana.
When he was 15, Finley claimed to be one of the first members of Hoe Hop, a sect of the Bloods street gang, the judge was told. Finley was also expelled from J.A. Fair Middle School for hitting another student in the head with a thrown log.
Defense attorney Julia Jackson called on the judge to transfer the case to juvenile court, citing testimony from Finley’s former probation officer that Finley had gotten top marks in the C-Step bootcamp program, but that juvenile services had “dropped the ball” by failing to enroll him and his parents in counseling and therapy services after he completed the program.
Jennie Promack, the probation officer, also told the judge that Finley’s divorced parents had been deeply committed to helping him succeed while he was under juvenile court supervision.
Finley’s mother, Glenda Wright, 34, told the judge that Finley had been enrolled in Job Corps to get his high school equivalency certificate and learn a trade when he was arrested. She said he had been diagnosed with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder at age 12, but that the medications he’d been treated with either caused debilitating side effects or were not effective.
Asked to describe his friends, Wright told the judge she did not care for some of them.
“I wouldn’t have them as my friends,” she said. “I feel like he hangs around the wrong crowd.”
Wright said Finley is a follower who is well-behaved when he is with his cousins but becomes a “totally different person” associating with his rougher friends. She said she’s tried to discourage those associations.
Finley’s attorney also questioned the strength of the evidence against the teenager in the shooting case. The only witness who has identified Finley as the shooter was Watson, who also initially lied to police about who he was, she said.
Watson identified Finley as the perpetrator at the scene, telling police the teen was a member of the Monroe Street gang, according to police reports.
Odom and Wallace were both shot in the stomach while sitting in Odom’s car shortly after sunset with Chantel Ward and Dontarius Lamar Lagoye, 22, in the back seat. A teen, Matthew McKenzie Hood, was talking to the people in the car, police said.
Police have identified Hood, 17, a former resident of the Montclair home, as a member of a gang feuding with the Monroe Street group. He is currently on probation for a felony gun conviction linked to a July 5 attempt to shoot a man.
Hood and Lagoye gave conflicting descriptions of the shooter’s car, while Ward and Odom said they did not see the gunman. Another man at the scene, Demetric Williams, 27, refused to cooperate with detectives, according to police testimony.
Finley has been jailed since his June 28 arrest at his Wooddale Drive home. Police reports show that the day after Finley’s arrest, his cousin, Lajardaan Hilliand, 18, was shot while driving in the 8300 block of Colonel Glenn Road by someone in a white sedan that had pulled up next to him in traffic. Some of the shots also struck a home at 8226 Vinewood Drive, police said.