Three teens plead guilty in Brooklyn mass shooting case

Three teens pleaded guilty Monday to varying charges stemming from the mass shooting at the Brooklyn Homes community last summer.

Two of the defendants, ages 15 and 16, pleaded guilty to first-degree assault and being a minor in possession of a handgun, with prosecutors agreeing to a sentence of 25 years incarceration with all but five years suspended. Each also received five years probation upon release from custody.

Both of them had been charged with attempted murder, a range of firearms offenses and inciting a riot. The Baltimore Sun does not name minors accused of crimes.

An 18-year-old, who was a minor at the time of the chaotic shooting, never faced charges involving violence. He was charged with inciting a riot and firearms offenses. He pleaded guilty to minor in possession of a firearm and was sentenced to five years in prison with all but one suspended.

The teen will have to complete a Roca program as part of his two years of probation, which will begin when he is released from prison imminently, given that he was credited for serving 10 months behind bars pending trial.

Baltimore Circuit Judge Jeffrey M. Geller, who accepted the pleas and imposed the agreed-upon sentences Monday, said the community likely would expect him to hand down harsher punishments, but the resolution represented the “reasonableness of the State’s Attorney’s Office” and the prospect of rehabilitation for the teens.

“The dangerousness of your actions, which instilled fear and harm in Brooklyn and sent shock waves through the city, cannot be understated,” said Geller, adding that he wouldn’t hesitate to give them lengthy periods of incarceration if any of the defendants was convicted of a violent or gun-related crime while on probation.

“It is my hope,” Geller continued, “that you will do exceptionally well on probation and be able to put all of this behind you.”

The agreements conclude three of five prosecutions stemming from the July 2, 2023, shootout that left two dead and 28 others wounded. What began as an annual community celebration that night devolved into disaster, becoming one of the highest casualty shootings in Baltimore’s history.

Tristan Jackson and Aaron Brown, both 19, each face seven counts of attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder, as well as a range of firearms offenses. Both are also charged with inciting a riot.

Prosecutors have extended plea offers, the terms of which have not been disclosed, to Jackson and Brown.

Plea negotiations intensified after Geller in March rejected prosecutors’ request to prosecute all five defendants together. Geller ordered three separate trials, one for the 18-year-old, another for the defendants aged 15 and 16, and a third for Jackson and Brown.

At the hearing preceding Geller’s order, defense attorneys raised doubts about the strength of the state’s case. They said the identifications of their clients were unreliable, and that the state’s sense of the sequence of events that night was murky at best.

Prosecutors had argued all 142 charges against the five defendants related to their “creating terror” either by opening fire or by handling a gun.

Amongst the debris left from a party attended by hundreds, police collected more than 100 cartridge casings fired by at least 12 different guns. But police and prosecutors have not determined who shot which of the 28 people who survived gunshot injuries. For the defendants accused of opening fire, they are charged with the attempted murder of “unknown victims.”

To this day, nobody has been arrested yet for the fatal shootings of 18-year-old Aaliyah Gonzalez and 20-year-old Kylis Fagbemi, whose families intend to sue the city. Their attorneys say the mass casualty event was preventable, citing official reports that indicated Baltimore Police had passed up opportunities to intervene before gunfire erupted.

Baltimore State’s Attorney Ivan Bates declined to comment following the pleas, but Michael Dunty, head of the office’s homicide unit, said in court Monday that the plea agreements do not preclude prosecutors from bringing additional charges if they develop evidence suggesting any of the teens were responsible for the deaths of Gonzalez or Fagbemi.

“Unknown individuals began discharging firearms causing terror among the attendees of the event,” Dunty said in court. “Individuals fled on foot, fled in cars, fled into various residences, and even hid behind cars and behind homes.”

Video footage showed Jackson and Brown arrived at the party in a gray sedan along with the 15-year-old and 16-year-old, according to a court filing from prosecutors. Detectives apparently identified them from what prosecutors described as distinctive clothing, even though one defense attorney said CCTV footage from the public housing community did not have color.

Investigators followed the group’s movement throughout the crowd by reviewing the video footage, watching as celebration turned to chaos around 12:30 a.m., when “an initial shooting occurred within the large crowd gathered around the stair area of the 800 (block) of Gretna Ct.,” prosecutors wrote in the filing.

Nineteen cartridge casings found in the “stair area” were “consistent with” having been fired by guns police eventually confiscated from Brown, the 15-year-old and 16-year-old.

Ballistics analysis suggested bullets test-fired from the confiscated guns were consistent with casings recovered in various areas of the sprawling crime scene.

Lawyers for the 15-year-old and 16-year-old expressed optimism in court that their clients, who will begin their sentences in the custody of the Department of Juvenile Services, would be released before being transferred to adult prison. People convicted of crimes of violence in Maryland become parole eligible after completing 50% of their punishments.

Defense attorney Warren Brown, who represents the younger teen, commended the judge’s compassion after court, saying the defendants were being “given an opportunity to get their lives together.”

Brown said the plea offers from prosecutors recognized what was a “truly circumstantial” case.

“It was a good compromise,” defense attorney John Cox, who represents the 16-year-old, told reporters. “I didn’t want him in the adult system.”

Cox’s client has achieved high marks at school at the Youth Detention Center in Baltimore and remained “virtually infraction free,” he said. “If what he’s done while he’s been in YDC is an indication of what he’ll do, then I’m confident.”

The 18-year-old, who was 17 at the time of the shooting, was pictured in a video on social media pulling a gun out of a backpack. He later told his mother he had a toy gun at the party, according to a filing from prosecutors, and his defense attorney has always maintained the gun was a toy.

Dunty said Monday that prosecutors would have called a police detective as a firearms expert witness at trial and that the detective would’ve testified he believed the gun the 18-year-old was pictured with was real. In a recorded call from jail, the teen expressed concerned about gunshot residue testing.

“The state would argue that GSR would only be of concern if the gun was real,” Dunty said.

The 18-year-old’s attorney, Michael Clinkscale, said in court that his client accepted responsibility and was eager to begin his programming with Roca, which would benefit him “far more than current incarceration.” He urged Geller to release the teen today, but the judge did not rule.

“I’m ready to get back to society,” the teen told Geller.

“I miss my family,” he added. “I’m ready to get back to school.”