Annapolis man sentenced to 25 years for robberies, shooting

A 24-year-old Annapolis man connected to two robberies and a shooting in the city was sentenced to 25 years in prison Friday.

After pleading guilty to first-degree assault and robbery in December, De’lass Troy Reid was handed 40 years incarceration by Anne Arundel Circuit Judge Stacy McCormack, with all but 25 years suspended. Twenty-five years is the maximum punishment for first-degree assault.

McCormack said Friday she encouraged public defender Bridget Elis to request a modification of sentence hearing for Reid. The judge said she was willing to consider modifying the punishment if Reid, a new father, showed promise and progress while being held by the state. For instance, McCormack told Reid she would like him to earn his GED credential.

“I want you to turn it around,” McCormack said. “I think it’s best for the community, for everyone if you turn it around.”

Reid was arrested June 11 on firearm possession charges after Annapolis Police found a “ghost gun” in his vehicle. Ghost guns are firearms that lack serial numbers and are assembled from parts often bought over the internet.

The discovery came hours after an attempted robbery on Melrob Court in which two men were shot by the same bullet. One of the men was hit in the chest, while the other was struck in the arm. Both were flown to R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore and later released.

The night he was arrested, Reid was pulled over in connection to a separate armed robbery on May 28. In that incident, a woman told authorities a man pointed a handgun at her head and demanded her cellphone and purse while she was walking on Chesapeake Avenue.

Reid was identified as a suspect after detectives watched surveillance footage from the businesses throughout Anne Arundel County and Baltimore City where the woman’s credit card was used after the robbery.

The victim addressed McCormack Friday, saying she is not the same person she was before the robbery.

She said her relationships and her once-active social life in Annapolis have been strained because she’s afraid to leave her house.

“It’s time he be held accountable for his actions,” she told the judge.

When Reid agreed to a plea deal, he initially asked for a maximum sentence of 18 years incarceration, which McCormack told him was impossible. The judge said she would keep her sentence somewhere in the 20- to 25-year range.

Prosecutor Glen Neubauer described Reid’s crimes as “senseless, senseless, senseless” with severe impacts on “several innocent victims.”

In asking for 20 years for her client, Elis said Reid was a perfect example of “somebody who was lost in the system.” She said Reid’s mother was a drug addict in Baltimore City, whose six children were in and out of foster care.

Elis said Reid has never known stability.

When given the opportunity to address McCormack himself, with his newborn son sitting in the gallery, Reid said he did not want his boy to grow up without a father like he did.