Wilkinsburg shooting trial awaits ruling on 1 defendant
Trial is scheduled to start Monday in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court in the 2016 mass shooting in Wilkinsburg that killed five adults and an unborn child.
Whether that trial will be against both men charged in the crime or just one remains unclear.
Cheron Shelton, 33, of Lincoln-Lemington, and Robert Thomas, 31, of Homewood, are accused in the March 9, 2016, attack on Franklin Avenue that killed three siblings and two cousins.
If they are convicted of firstdegree murder, the prosecution is seeking the death penalty.
However, following a flurry of motions, argument and accusations of prosecutorial misconduct over the past 10 days, whether the case against Thomas will proceed at all is now in question.
On Friday, Judge Edward J. Borkowski said he would rule Monday morning whether to grant a defense motion to dismiss charges against Thomas.
Defense attorney Casey White filed a motion late Thursday arguing that there was no longer enough evidence to sustain a conviction. Mr. White cited that the district attorney’s office decided just earlier that day that it would not be calling at trial a controversial jailhouse informant who claimed to have evidence against his client.
He asked that the case against Thomas be thrown out.
Whether Thomas remains or not, Judge Borkowski declared that the case against Shelton will proceed.
Jury selection began on Jan. 6 and lasted nearly three full weeks. The process took significantly longer than in a typical trial because of several complicating factors: The trial is expected to last three weeks; there are more than 100 names on the witness list; and it is a capital case.
In a death penalty case, potential jurors must understand not only the process in the guilt phase of the trial, but also the penalty phase. To accomplish this, the attorneys in the case had to read to each individual a lengthy explanation of the law, as well as the deliberative process.
And that was before they had even asked the panelists if they had any moral, ethical or philosophical objection to the death penalty.
It was not unusual for the attorneys to have spent 30 minutes or more going through the voir dire process before learning that the individual they were interviewing did not believe in the death penalty, and then, ultimately, having to excuse that person from service.
A total of 12 jurors and six alternates were selected. However, one of those alternates was excused Friday after revealing a previously undisclosed medical condition.
Six men and six women will sit as jurors, and three women and two men will serve as alternates. The jury includes a Vietnam War veteran, a man who works in telecom sales, a nurse and a man who works for the state.
The jurors will not be sequestered during the trial.
They are expected to hear from dozens of prosecution witnesses over the course of the trial.
According to investigators, the victims had gathered at Brittany Powell’s home at 1304 Franklin Ave. the evening of March 9, 2016, for a cookout to enjoy the unseasonably warm weather.
Detectives said Shelton and Thomas were alerted to a Facebook post that noted that Lamont Powell would be at the cookout.
According to police, Shelton believed that Lamont Powell had killed his best friend, Calvin Doswell, in Lincoln-Lemington in 2013.
At 10:54 p.m., detectives said, Shelton and Thomas approached the house from Hazel Way. Thomas was armed with a .40-caliber handgun, police said, which he fired 18 times toward the group in the backyard, sending them fleeing to the porch for cover. Then, detectives said, Shelton used an assault-style rifle and sprayed the group with 31 more bullets.
Siblings Jerry Michael Shelton, 35, Brittany Powell, 27, and Chanetta Powell, 25, who was eight months pregnant; and their cousins Tina Shelton, 37, and Shada Mahone, 26, were killed. Three others were wounded, including Lamont Powell.
Powell has been uncooperative with prosecutors and told a detective in December, “You might as well arrest me, I’m not coming.”
He was picked up on a material witness warrant issued by the DA’s office on Jan. 22 and is being held at the Allegheny County Jail pending his testimony.
The day after his arrest, Powell and Thomas were involved in an altercation at the jail. Neither man was injured.
The trial will operate under heightened security. There will be metal detectors set up at the entrance to the third-floor courtroom — in addition to those at the doors to the courthouse — and cellphones will be required to be stored in a locked pouch each time a spectator enters the room.