A Terrible Homicide in Little Rock and Trial Set for Suspects

Update:  Kevin Banks of Little Rock was convicted for murder in this case.  Two other defendants await trial...more developing.

Brothers set for trial in 6-year-old’s death

Prosecutors expected to cite role of drugs

By John Lynch

Sunday, September 14, 2008

LITTLE ROCK — Nine months after 6-year-old Kamya Weathersby died in her bed in a hail of gunfire, prosecutors are expected to reveal why she was killed.

The three Little Rock brothers accused of killing her are scheduled to stand trial on capital-murder charges this week.

The defendants are Kevin Lawrence Banks, 18; Ricky Dale Smith, 20; and Marqus Tyrell Smith, 21.

Police and prosecutors, spooked by the slaying of a witness, have played their cards close to the vest, revealing only as much evidence in court as the preliminary hearings require.

But what authorities have revealed signals they believe that disputes and feuds in Little Rock’s illegal drug trade played a role.

The trial, which is scheduled to open Wednesday, goes back to the night of Dec. 29, 2007, when Kamya was watching TV in bed with her 3-year-old sister, Jasirae Vick. Gunmen, wielding a rifle and a pistol, opened fire on their home.

The girls’ mother, Lashandria Washington, her boyfriend, 29-year-old Antoine Demetrius “Turtle” Jones, and their 2-month-old daughter, Aria, were asleep in a back bedroom.

When the gunfire broke out, police say, the adults heard the girls scream for help. The gunmen shot Kamya, barely two weeks past her sixth birthday, seven times, once in the head. One bullet grazed Jasirae’s leg.

Investigators collected 132 spent rounds from inside the home and 41 shell casings outside, court filings show. The gunfire almost destroyed the Martin Luther King Boulevard home, a detective has testified, describing the scene as a “war zone.”

Only last week, however, did prosecutors offer a motive for the gunfire. Even then, they qualified it as a partial motive.

In a hearing Thursday, Chief Deputy Prosecuting Attorney John Johnson told Pulaski County Circuit Judge Chris Piazza that the assault on Kamya’s homewas provoked after Antoine Jones accused Banks of killing Jones’ friend, 25-year-old Brent Pettus. Pettus had been killed nine days earlier.

Jones was the target of the assault on the house, Johnson said.

Piazza will preside over the brothers’ trial.

Johnson also told the judge that the three brothers and Jones shared “business” interests but didn’t elaborate. Jones has told reporters that he and Banks were friends.

Washington, Kamya’s mother, has said the shootings stemmed from a “misunderstanding.”

On Dec. 20, Pettus was found shot to death inside a still-running 1976 Oldsmobile Cutlass in the 3200 block of Center Street, a couple of blocks from Jones’ mother’s home, court records show. Pettus lived about three blocks from Banks and his co-defendant brothers, Ricky Dale Smith, and Marqus Tyrell Smith.

Arrested on suspicion of Pettus’ slaying three days after Kamya was killed, Banks alone is charged with first-degree murder in Pettus’ death, with his trial scheduled for November. According to an arrest affidavit, Banks told a witness he killed Pettus when Pettus tried to “short” him of marijuana in a drug deal.

Three weeks after his arrest, Banks was charged with capital murder in Kamya’s killing. But a month later, after someone killed a witness in the Pettus case, authorities started sealing arrest warrants to protect the identity of other witnesses in both slayings.

Thomas Steven Okafur, 21, was a witness in Pettus’ case. Okafur was found shot to death Feb. 29 in a city park near Arch Street and Interstate 30. Police believe someone killed Okafur elsewhere then dumped him in the park as a warning to other witnesses. Police haven’t arrested anyone in his death, and prosecutors haven’t revealed what Okafur knew.

In May, police arrested the Smith brothers, half-brothers to Banks, and charged them with capital murder in Kamya’s death. Authorities haven’t disclosed what evidence led them to the pair. The brothers also face four counts of committing a terroristic act, which represents the shots fired at the rest of the family.

Prosecutors are seeking a life sentence for the brothers, whose trial may not start on Wednesday. Their attorney, Lea Ellen Fowler, may seek a separate trial for Ricky Smith, a move prosecutors said they will oppose. A hearing Monday will determine whether the defense is ready for trial.

The two key players in the case, prosecutors say, are Kevin Banks, one of the defendants, and Antoine Jones, who was asleep in the house when Kamya died and who is expected to testify against Banks.

Both defendant and witness have a history of run-ins with the law.

KEVIN BANKS

Court files show Banks was arrested in August 2006, about six weeks before his 17th birthday, after he and an accomplice tried to break into a home on South Center Street, about four blocks north of the place where Pettus later was killed.

According to an arrest report, a neighbor confronted Banks and Wayne Earl Jones Jr., then 18, during the burglary attempt at 2823 S. Center St. Banks and Wayne Jones, both carrying pistols, threatened the neighbor and another person at a home across the street, according to court files.

Police charged Banks with attempted residential burglary, aggravated assault and a misdemeanor gun charge.

Court files show Banks was placed into the custody of the Department of Youth Services in October 2006 and subsequently was incarcerated in the state’s Southeast Arkansas Regional Juvenile Program in Dermott in January 2007.

A February 2007 report from a caseworker shows that Banks “decided to display physical violence on his peers for no reason at all,” and a juvenile pressed charges against Banks, saying he caused bodily harm.

The worker also noted that Banks was “displaying a lot of negative behavior on his own.” A report later that month described Banks as a “very playful” youth who “takes things for a joke.” Banks told the worker that his most important goal was to earn his high school diploma, and he promised practice self-control and thinking before he acted, according to the report.

In March 2007, Banks was transferred to the Dermott juvenile correctional facility after being charged with inciting a riot and first-degree assault. An April 2007 report shows he waived his right to a trial and pleaded guilty to a charge that is not described.

About two weeks after his transfer, according to a June 2007 report, Banks was placed in administrative segregation for putting a broom in another resident’s face, which Banks blamed on boredom and described as “horseplay.” The report indicated this was hislast disciplinary problem while in custody.

The report said Banks would remain in custody until October 2007 but noted the discharge date could change depending on his behavior. The report shows Banks earned his high school diploma and raised his test scores by two grades.

It’s not clear when Banks was released from juvenile custody. Initially charged as an adult, his case was transferred to juvenile court in June 2007 by Circuit Court Judge Willard Proctor Jr.

In March 2007, Wayne Jones, a neighbor of Banks’ on Arch Street, pleaded guilty to all charges - first-degree criminal mischief, attempted residential burglary, two counts of aggravated assault and a misdemeanor weapons count - and was sentenced to five years probation with a $1,000 fine.

ANTOINE JONES

Antoine Jones, not related to Wayne Jones, drew a 10-year federal prison sentence when he was 18 for his role in the robbery of a Hope pharmacy in March 1996 with three other men: Charles Matthew Newsome, Willie Stephens III and Antoine L. Perkins. Jones was released in May 2005 to serve three years on supervised release and had to obtain court permission to move to Little Rock.

Barely a year out of prison, police arrested Jones in June 2006 on a first-degree murder warrant in the Halloween 2005 slaying of Earl “Lil Earl” Williams Jr. of Little Rock.

The 30-year-old Williams was found dead in the 200 block of East 27th Street in the Little Rock housing projects. Someone had shot him five times, including once in the face. He had a fully loaded revolver tucked in his coveralls. According to an arrest affidavit, detectives heard that someone named “Turtle” had killed. A man named Cornelius Chambers had been with him, documents show. Investigators determined Antoine Jones was the man known as Turtle. Both Chambers and Jones said they saw Williams the night he was killed but denied any role in his death.

Detectives moved to arrest Jones eight months later after 26-year-old Christopher Lashawn “Lil Chris” Perkins of Little Rock told them he witnessed the slaying.

Perkins claimed he was in a car with the men when Jones pulled a pistol and shot Williams during an argument about the April 2005 murder of Julian Christopher “Piru” Branch, according to the affidavit.

Perkins knew details about Williams’ slaying that only someone present during the killing wouldknow, according to the affidavit. But prosecutors declined to formally charge Jones in the slaying. They were concerned about building a murder case almost solely on the testimony of Perkins, who has a 12-year criminal history of violence and theft.

Jones’ next scrape with the law was on March 1, 2007, when he was arrested during a raid by Little Rock police and agents of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

The raid took place just a couple of houses down from the Martin Luther King Drive home he would later share with Kamya and her mother. The target of the raid was 26-year-old Randall Devone Armstrong, court records show, suspected of drug-dealing after confidential informants reported twice purchasing crack cocaine from Armstrong at the home.

The raid netted three grams of cocaine, a 9mm pistol and a .45-caliber handgun. Armstrong is scheduled to stand trial on charges resulting from the raid Monday.

Jones wasn’t formally charged, but federal prosecutors tried to send him back to prison, arguing that the arrest violated the terms of his supervised release, which was set to expire May 1, 2007. At a hearing, Jones denied criminalwrongdoing in the arrest but acknowledged failing a drug test. The federal judge, James Moody, declined to send him to prison but ordered him to seek drug treatment, court records show.

The arrest would return to haunt Jones in May, when he was arrested on federal weapons charges during a warrants sweep that also nabbed Ricky Smith on a similar charge.

Jones is prohibited from having bullets and guns because heis a convicted felon. According to a federal affidavit, federal agents believe the .45 caliber pistol seized during the March 2007 raid belongs to Jones.

Jones also is accused of illegally possessing ammunition on two occasions: the night Kamya was killed and during a May shooting attempt in North Little Rock that targeted him, Kamya’s mother and their infant daughter. Jones is scheduled to stand trial on those charges in January.

Arkansas, Pages 21, 23 on 09/14/2008