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A 20-year-old man accused of shooting and killing two men and a teenage boy inside an SUV in February will stand trial on the charges, a judge ruled Thursday.
Gerald Grant is charged with three counts of first-degree felony aggravated murder, first-degree felony aggravated robbery and second-degree felony obstruction of justice. He pleaded not guilty to the charges on Thursday, following a preliminary hearing.
Killed in the Feb. 18 shooting were 20-year-old Angel Lopez-Salinas, his 19-year-old brother, Lauro Raul Lopez-Salinas and 17-year-old Armando Cuenca-Curiel.
After hearing from witnesses over the last four days, 3rd District Judge James Blanch ruled that there was enough evidence for the case to move on to trial — though Grant's attorneys had argued that there was no evidence of a robbery and that their client acted in self-defense.
Witnesses have testified that both Grant and the other men were planning to rob each other during a meet-up to sell marijuana.
In the end, Grant left the SUV with a gunshot wound in the leg. Cuenca-Curiel was shot in the side, and died in the SUV parked in the road at 325 E. Park Creeke Lane (3060 South). The two brothers were each shot in the head, and died later at a local hospital.
Grant's attorney, Wojciech Nitecki, said in closing arguments Thursday that his client shot the three men in self-defense and fired his gun after he had been shot in the leg. He said there is no evidence that Grant robbed the men, noting that marijuana and money were still in the SUV when police arrived. Nitecki added that it doesn't make sense for Grant to have gotten into a car alone with three men with the intent to rob them.
Prosecutor Thaddeus May argued that there were several pieces of evidence that showed the shooting was not an act of self-defense. That included a lack of injury to Grant's face or injuries to the shooting victims' hands — which would have shown there was an assault, as Grant had later told his friends — along with evidence that Grant brought a gun to the drug buy and did not bring enough money to pay for the drugs that were promised.
A second man, Mahad Abdirashid Omar, also is charged as an accomplice in the three deaths. The 21-year-old man was originally charged in June with obstructing justice for allegedly aiding Grant in leaving the scene and for not reporting what he knew about the shootings.
On Friday — based on recently acquired text messages between Omar and Grant — prosecutors amended the charges against Omar, adding three counts of murder and one count of aggravated robbery.
Charging documents allege that Grant had texted Omar earlier on Feb. 18, saying he had robbed a man for a few hundred dollars the night before and asking Omar to set up another "plan." Omar allegedly set up the exchange with a contact and then texted Grant to tell him to bring a gun.
Isaac Gbaway drove Grant and Omar to a strip mall, where Grant got into an SUV with the contact, according to the charges. Gbaway and Omar intended to follow the SUV but lost sight of it, the charges say. They picked him up on Park Creeke Lane after Grant called and said he had been shot. Another friend gave Grant and Omar a ride to the restaurant where Grant's girlfriend picked them up and took them to a local hospital, according to testimony.
Grant will be in court again on Oct. 24 for a pretrial conference.