WITNESSES: WOMEN’S KILLERS FIRED 2 GUNS
Macomb prosecutor calls the homicides an ‘ambush,’ ‘hit’
Two witnesses testified Wednesday at a double-murder, double-defendant trial they heard gunshots from two guns come from a Clinton Township apartment complex.
The two men were among three witnesses who took the stand in Macomb County Circuit Court on the first day of the trial of Dajuan D. Davenport, 22, and Darrell S. Banks, 21, who are each charged with first-degree, premeditated murder in the January 2021 shooting deaths of Dazhane Holloway, 19, and Dionna Davis, 18, outside the building at Knottingham Apartments on Wellington Crescent east of Gratiot Avenue.
“I heard a pop, pop, pop and then a boom, boom, boom,” testified Bruce Neault, who resided in Knottingham. “It was really two distinct sounds.”
Benjamin Pultorak, who lived in a home adjacent to the apartments and said he owns and fires guns, testified he heard eight to 10 shots from a .45 or .40 caliber handgun and then about 15 shots from an AR-15 rifle.
“I heard a succession of eight, nine, 10 loud bands,” he said on the stand. “I first thought it was a hammer.”
Immediately after that, “I heard a different frequently of bang, bang, bang” that occurred at a slower pace, about a halfsecond between each shot, he said.
He added he then heard what he believed was “a muscle” that “peeled out,” telling a police dispatcher moments after the incident the vehicle sounded like a “souped up Hemi, maybe even a Hellcat.” He was in his living room and did not see the vehicle or the suspects.
The two suspects were captured after fleeing in a Hellcat Dodge Charger, equipped with a Hemi engine, after crashing it into a pole on Eight Mile and Hayes roads in Eastpointe while fleeing police at speeds exceeding 130 mph, said Assistant Macomb Prosecutor Anthony Servitto in his opening statement. The vehicle had been stolen.
Servitto told jurors the defendants waited in the Charger to ambush the women at the apartment complex. The Charger was backed into a parking space in a second row of spaces away from the apartment building while Holloway parked her vehicle moments before closer to the building.
“What happens next is an ambush, essentially put, a hit,” he said, but did not elaborate on a potential motive.
Police found a .45 caliber handgun allegedly fired by Davenport and AR-15 rifle allegedly
fired by Banks in the Charger.
Both suspects were injured from the crash, and Banks suffered a bullet wound to his rear thigh area that Macomb prosecutors allege was fired by Davenport, who was behind Banks when they approached their victims.
Servitto told the jury the two men fired 40 shots — 24 from the rifle and 16 from the handgun — at the two victims as they unloaded groceries from a vehicle.
Davis, who had exited the apartment building to help Holloway remove the groceries, was struck five times as she tried to run back in the house, Servitto said. She was struck twice in the back, twice in her flank and once in her thigh.
Holloway, who was hiding behind an open car door, was struck once in the face, he said.
The shooting triggered “a few calls,” a 911 dispatcher told one of the callers.
Neault testified he looked out the living room window of his first-floor apartment after hearing the shots and saw a “dark model Dodge (Charger), similar to the model the police department uses” being driven from the scene.
Witness Hannah Archer, who resided in a third-floor apartment, said after hearing the shots and “ducking down,” she went to her bedroom window and saw Black males running to a “black car.”
“They went into the car and took off,” she said.
She described one man as wearing dark clothes and another wearing yellow clothes.
Davenport was found wearing a black coat and Banks was found donned in a yellow hoodie, Servitto said.
Both of the defense referred to the prosecutor’s description of the as a “theory” or “theories.”
“The state will not be able to prove this is firstdegree murder,” attorney Thomas Machasic, representing Davenport, told the jury.
Attorney Craig Tank, representing Banks, told jurors they will learn of a different version of what happened from the prosecution’s version.
“What you’re going to see here is something markedly different than the theory that’s been promulgated or talked about by the prosecutor here today,” he said. “What you’re going to see is a different version of facts of facts of what transpired. … We ask that you listen to it and observe it from the witness stand and make your own conclusions based on upon the testimony rather than based upon than someone else’s (version). At the close of the proofs, I am going to ask you for a verdict of not guilty because this case is going to remain as it does now, unproven.”
A request for a mistrial by Ryan Machasic, also representing Davenport, was rejected by Judge Julie Gatti. Machasic claimed the jury should not have been able to hear Pultorak testify that he has had heard gunshots in the area previously.
He argued that prejudiced the jury against his client and improperly shifted the burden of proof on the defense.
Gatti ruled before the trial the jury could not learn that Holloway’s 18-month-old child was in her vehicle when she was shot. The child was uninjured.
The first day of the trial was attended by about two dozen people in the gallery.
The prosecution plans to call 12 witnesses and the trial is expected to last until at least Friday.
It resumes Thursday in the Mount Clemens courthouse. Each defendant remains held in the county in lieu of a $1 million bond.