Mother of defendant in homicide case to serve 7 years
Tampering with evidence count related to daughter’s case to be dismissed
The mother of a woman accused of murder following a Warren pool party entered pleas to drug and weapons charges that will result in her spending 7½ years in prison.
Schakerra Starks,
44, pleaded no contest in Macomb County Circuit Court on Tuesday to four charges in exchange for dismissal of several other charges, including tampering with evidence related to the June 2021 fatal shooting involving her daughter, Ashinay Horton-Starks, 24, of Johnice Clark, in a plea deal with Macomb prosecutors.
In a sentencing deal with the judge, she will serve 5½ years for possession of between 50 and 449 grams of cocaine and another two years for possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. During a June 11, 2021, search of her home, police found drugs and a weapon six days after the shooting involving her daughter. Police had a warrant on suspicion she tampered with evidence related to the shooting, according to Rebecca Kelley, assistant Macomb prosecutor .
“That (the search warrant) is what led to the other charges. That’s a dealer amount,” Kelley said in reference to the amount of cocaine found at the scene.
Starks also pleaded no contest to possession of less than 25 grams of a controlled substance and attempted felon firearm for actions in October 2021 in Roseville.
Starks was charged with tampering with evidence for allowing her daughter, Horton-Starks, to hide her vehicle in her garage and attempted tampering for trying to get another witness to retrieve shell casings from the shooting scene.
Several other charges will be dismissed, including an uttering publishing charge from 2020, at her April 6 sentencing by Judge Diane Druzinski.
Starks remains held in the county jail in lieu of $1.05 million in bonds.
Druzinski also recently elevated a second-degree murder charge against Horton-Starks to first-degree, premeditated murder upon request of Assistant Macomb Prosecutor Steve Fox.
Horton-Starks is accused of shooting Clark in the head while each was riding in separate vehicles June 5, 2021, near 12 Mile and Schoenherr roads after Clark poured a drink on a friend of Horton-Starks who was standing near Clark’s stopped vehicle immediately following an argument at a nearby pool party.
Horton-Starks fled the state and was on the loose for seven months before she was apprehended by U.S. Marshals in Bismarck, N.D. on Dec. 29, 2021, and extradited to Michigan in January 2022.
Horton-Starks, who remains held without bond, faces a Feb. 27 pretrial in circuit court.