Prosecutors tie fingerprints, testimonies to murder suspects
SUMMERVILLE, Ga. — After they shot the convenience store clerk in the gut, punched him in the face, pistol whipped him and snatched rolls of pennies, cigars and Kool 100 cigarettes, prosecutors say, two teenagers grabbed bags of Doritos on their way out the door.
“This is the value they equated to the man’s life,” Assistant District Attorney Kevin Baugh told a jury Tuesday morning during opening statements for the murder trial of Dylon Dave Allen and Zaykives Banard McCray.
The robbery occurred at the Melanie Inn Convenience Store on Hawkins Drive in January 2016. The victim, 47-year-old Chiragkumar Patel, died two months later at Floyd Medical Center as a result of the gunshot wound.
Summerville Police and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation identified Allen and McCray as the killers based on statements from some acquaintances, as well as items found at the home of Allen’s girlfriend. They charged the two men, who were 18 at the time, with malice murder, felony murder, armed robbery, aggravated assault, possession of a firearm during a crime, wearing a mask to conceal their identity and simple battery.
On Tuesday, however, attorneys for Allen and McCray told the jury the investigation leaned too heavily on unreliable witnesses. According to the police account, the two men received a ride from a couple of women the night of the robbery.
The attorneys argued that the two women, Shannon Coalson and Thyis Greene, blamed Allen and McCray for the murder to preserve themselves — though the lawyers didn’t go so far as to say Coalson and Greene committed the crimes.
“The rubber meets the road with those two humans,” said Steven Miller, an attorney for Allen.
“If Shannon Coalson had not started naming names at that point,” added McCray’s lawyer, Jad Johnson, “there’s a good possibility she would have ended up in jail.”
During his opening statement, Baugh told the jury that Coalson gave the two men a ride in her burgundy Chrysler Sebring on the night of the burglary because McCray told her he needed to pick up some money from a family member in Summerville. Greene was in the car, too.
Coalson dropped Allen and McCray off on Fourth Street, and the two men walked two blocks north to the Melanie Inn Convenience Store, known locally as “The Cafe.”
Inside, surveillance video shows two men in sweatshirts and masks. One of them shoots Patel. The other begins punching him over and over. One of them also shoves a customer to the floor. The one with the gun pistol whips Patel. They then grab the cigarettes, cigars, rolls of coins and chips.
Baugh told the jury that as the men ran outside, a customer was pulling up. One of the defendants pointed his gun at the man, Kaine Darden.
Later, as they met with Coalson and Greene and drove away, Darden tracked them from a distance. He didn’t manage to make out the license plate number, but he was able to give investigators a description of the car.
The next day, police pulled over a vehicle matching Darden’s description. Inside, they found Coalson’s boyfriend, along with wrappers for the Doritos and Black & Mild Cigars. That led them to Coalson’s house. At first, she told investigators she didn’t know anything about a robbery in Summerville.
Days later, though, she and Greene admitted to driving Allen and McCray to the area on the night in question. Police later searched the home of Allen’s girlfriend. Baugh said they found a shoe box containing items from the robbery, including some Kool 100 cigarettes. Allen’s and McCray’s fingerprints were on the box.
The lawyers for Allen and McCray, who are being prosecuted together, said Coalson and Greene are not reliable witnesses. They faced pressure of criminal charges themselves, and they had several days to come up with a story before meeting with investigators.
Also, Miller said, Coalson told investigators that she brought her baby with her the night of the robbery. But her boyfriend also told investigators that he kept the baby with him at home that night.
“Someone’s going to have to explain to you how a baby can be in two places at once,” Miller told the jury.
The trial will resume today.