A Solano County Superior Courtroom decide will set separate trial dates for 2 males accused of a lethal 2016 Vallejo pawn store theft that ended with the shop proprietor’s gunshot slaying, the wounding of an worker and the demise of the shop’s canine.
Amonie Azoun Andre Summerise, 28, of Vallejo, and Kashius Brazeal-Nelson, 26, a state jail inmate previously of Vallejo, appeared Thursday in Division 2 in Vallejo for a trial setting.
Listening to the attorneys stipulate that the jury trial for every defendant could be severed, Decide Daniel Healy ordered them to return at 8:30 a.m. March 4 and eight:30 a.m. March 25 within the Justice Constructing.
However, in response to official courtroom paperwork, Healy mentioned he'll decide on the subsequent listening to, a trial affirmation scheduled for 8:30 a.m. July 28, which trial shall be heard first.
Deputy Alternate Public Defender Robert Boyle represents Summerise, and Vallejo-based legal protection lawyer Dustin M. Gordon represents Brazeal-Nelson. Chief Deputy District Lawyer Paul Sequeira represented the Solano County DA’s Workplace in the course of the morning continuing.
The attorneys estimated every trial would take three to 4 weeks, courtroom paperwork confirmed.
As beforehand reported, in the course of the previous three pandemic years, Solano County courts officers decreased courtroom operations and rescheduled proceedings, as crucial, in accord with county, state, and state Supreme Courtroom public well being directives, which have accounted for some delays.
Because the case wound its method by means of the courts, proceedings towards a suspected third particular person initially charged, Elijah Elliott Summerise, 25, brother of Amonie, have been dismissed Sept. 11, 2019, courtroom information point out.
Brazeal-Nelson, who has been transferred from Calipatria State Jail, the place he's serving time for a previous felony conviction, and the elder Summerise stay with out bail within the Stanton Correctional Facility in Fairfield. They've pleaded not responsible to a number of felony allegations every.
In months previous, Chief Deputy District Lawyer Bruce Flynn has led the prosecution of the case, which falls underneath the particular circumstances class as a result of the killing was dedicated throughout a theft, crimes recorded on the shop’s video surveillance digicam. The 2 defendants face the demise penalty or life with out the opportunity of parole if convicted at trial. It's nonetheless unclear, nonetheless, if the DA’s Workplace will pursue the demise penalty.
After proceedings in October 2019, the protection attorneys on the time for the elder Summerise, Boyle and Sean Swartz, the latter additionally a deputy alternate public defender, confirmed that the demise penalty was “nonetheless on the desk.” As a result of the fees make it a possible demise penalty case, they have been assigned to symbolize Summerise collectively.
Apart from first-degree homicide and tried homicide fees, Summerise, courtroom information present, faces three counts of second-degree theft and one depend of being a felon in possession of a firearm. Additionally in addition to homicide and tried homicide fees, Brazeal-Nelson is charged with three counts of second-degree theft, being a felon in possession of a firearm, stemming from a previous conviction in Santa Clara County, and a cost of animal cruelty for killing the shop’s canine.
Vallejo police information point out officers responded at about 3:10 p.m. Dec. 20, 2016, to experiences of a attainable theft in progress on the Pawn Benefit Retailer on Springs Highway.
Retailer proprietor Timothy Pult, 49, of San Anselmo, and store worker Josh Poole, of Fairfax, have been discovered inside, every affected by gunshot wounds. Pult’s canine, Copper, a Chesapeake Bay retriever, was discovered shot to demise close to the shop entrance.
Police initially launched a surveillance video of the theft in January 2017 in an effort to determine the suspects. In July, they launched 24 seconds of footage that confirmed two males enter the store, their faces lined, weapons of their palms.
The publicly out there footage doesn’t present the shootings, nevertheless it reveals the suspects shortly leaving the shop, with certainly one of them turning again and pointing his weapon on the canine earlier than the video ends.
Pult was pronounced useless on the scene, whereas Poole, who makes use of a wheelchair, was transported to a neighborhood trauma heart. Poole, then 45, survived, however, for a time, continued to obtain medical therapy for his wounds.
The Summerises have been taken into custody in Vallejo on July 12, 2017. Brazeal-Nelson was arrested July 16 on the Imperial County state jail, the place he's at present serving a sentence for a Yolo County theft.
Boyle beforehand mentioned the demise penalty, which stays on the books within the Golden State, should still apply within the case, despite the fact that Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2019 issued an government order suspending executions in California.