Little Rock homicide detectives used social media to help them arrest one suspect in a fatal shooting Monday, one of two homicides in the city this week.
After picking up 15-year old Kaylon Robinson on Christmas Eve on a weapons charge, detectives arrested Robinson again late Thursday afternoon and charged him with capital murder in the early Monday morning shooting that left Verico Ingram, 26, in his car parked near West 15th and Abigail streets with fatal wounds from a close-range shotgun blast.
Then on Friday, homicide detectives announced they had obtained a first-degree murder warrant for Jamar Jordan in a separate shooting that left Austin Burks, 26, shot in the head on the 1500 block of Adams Street. Burks was pronounced dead at UAMS Medical Center minutes later.
Lt. Sidney Allen, spokesman for the department, said that though the killings occurred a day and only a few blocks apart, detectives had not found a connection between the shootings.
“On the surface it doesn’t appear they’re linked,” Allen said. “But you can’t rule that out, anything, until they complete the current investigations.”
A witness who heard the shotgun blasts sometime after midnight Monday saw two teenage males running from the scene, according to police reports.
Allen said he did not have any further information about the second suspect.
After finding Ingram “unconscious” and “slumped” over in his car, detectives were told by a witness that one of the suspects was carrying a sawed-off shotgun. Later, they were told Robinson might have been involved in the shooting.
Detectives went to the teenager’s Facebook account, according to affidavits, and found a picture of Robinson holding and shooting a sawed-off shotgun.
The investigators acquired a search warrant for Robinson’s 4414 W. 16th St. home, which is within four blocks of where Ingram was shot, and a Monday search of the house turned up “several items of evidentiary value.”
The next day, Robinson surrendered to homicide detectives on a felony warrant for criminal use of a prohibited weapon and then confessed to owning and using the sawed-off shotgun, according to the affidavit.
On Thursday, witnesses identified Robinson as one of the men involved in Ingram’s killing, and another person told detectives Robinson had admitted to them that he was involved in the killing.
According to that person’s account, Robinson and another youth tried to rob Ingram and ended up shooting him.
After being taken from the jail by detectives to the Little Rock Police Department headquarters Thursday for further questioning, Robinson “refused to acknowledge detectives” or “go over a Miranda form” with investigators.
He was charged as an adult in Ingram’s killing and taken back to the Pulaski County jail where he was “too combative” to leave a thumb print, according to arrest reports.
Robinson remained at the Pulaski County jail Friday night. Following an initial court appearance Friday morning, Judge Alice Lightle set bail at $275,000 on the two charges.
On Tuesday, detectives went to the 1500 block of Adams Street after several shots were fired, and Burks was found in the street with a gunshot wound.
According to reports, Burks was standing along the street about 3:30 p.m. when a maroon Nissan Maxima drove by and a passenger opened fire.
Police eventually found the vehicle used in the driveby and tied Jordan to Burks’ killing, officials said.
The department declined to provide any other information that connected Jordan to the Christmas Eve killing other than to say they had a murder warrant naming Jordan and warned that Jordan was “armed and dangerous.”
As of Friday afternoon, Jordan remained at large.
Arkansas, Pages 11 on 12/28/2013