Man charged with killing Newport News officer pleads guilty to federal charges
NEWPORT NEWS — A 39-year-old Newport News man accused of dragging a rookie Newport News police officer to her death earlier this year pleaded guilty Friday to federal gun and drug charges stemming from the case.
Vernon E. Green II was sitting in a parked car on 16th Street on Jan. 23 when Officer Katherine “Katie” Thyne and another police officer were questioning him about smoking marijuana.
Court documents say the officers approached Green after another officer — keeping watch over Monitor-Merrimac Overlook Park via a remote camera — passed along word that
Green and his passenger might be smoking pot.
At the time, Green was out on bond from a 2016 bank robbery charge out of North Carolina, with his release provisions requiring that he stay out of further trouble.
As the officers were questioning him, Green suddenly hit the gas pedal and took off — leaving the Thyne, 24, trapped by the fleeing car and wedged between the car and a tree.
She became the first Newport News police officer killed in the line of duty in more than 25 years.
Newport News police charged Green with felony murder, a form of second-degree murder for accidental deaths that occur in the course of another felony — in this case, eluding police.
He also was charged with failing to stop at an accident scene — a felony — and misdemeanor marijuana possession.
But while that case is pending — as is the North Carolina bank robbery charge — federal prosecutors hit Green in June with two federal counts stemming from the case: Possessing a firearm as a convicted felon and another pot charge.
A statement of facts agreed to by both sides as part of Friday's plea agreement said officers found a 9mm handgun just outside the crashed car, in a “soft blue cooler bag.” The bag had Green's fingerprints and his work ID.
A crime scene technician found “small amounts of marijuana” in the car, inside a partially burnt blunt and in a plastic bag.
The federal gun and drug charges are felonies on account of Green's 2003 cocaine possession charge in Newport News Circuit Court. Green, now being held at the Western Tidewater Regional Jail, will be sentenced in the federal case on Feb. 18.
He has a probable cause hearing on the murder case scheduled for Dec. 2 in Newport News General District Court, and faces up to 71 years on those various charges.