After a preliminary examination with three witnesses on June 20, Chief 34th District Court Judge Tina Brooks Green bound Keegan Maguire Delaney, who recently turned 18, over to circuit court for a July 18 arraignment on the information.
Delaney is charged with two counts of armed robbery in the April 9 robbery at gunpoint of two 10-year-old boys in a park at Belleville Manor mobile home park, 8701 Belleville Road.
Delaney, who was a Belleville High School student at the time of the robbery, is accused of being the get-away driver. Two juveniles were arrested for the actual robbery and a third taken in without charges. Their cases are being handled in juvenile court.
The two young victims were the first witnesses to testify before Judge Green.
The first one said he asked his mother if he could go to the house of his friend, who was also 10 at the time. They were walking to the friend’s house together when two black males and a white male approached them.
The three teenagers stopped the boys and asked if they had any drugs for sale, the witness said. They said no.
“One of the black males asked to use my phone to call his mom and … I said no,” the witness said.
The white male pulled a gun from inside his pants, the witness testified.
“It didn’t look real. He pulled the trigger and nothing came out … He pointed it at (my friend).”
He testified that the white male searched his friend by digging through his pockets and took his friend’s phone. When his friend told him the phone had a tracker, the white male threw it on the ground.
The witness said one of the black males, who had a gun, took his phone.
“He had a gun and I was trying not to get shot in my stomach,” where the gun was placed against him, he said.
The witness said the three left with his phone and got into a black and grey Dodge Challenger with tinted windows and drove away. He identified Delaney as the driver of the car.
He testified that he felt scared and he thought they might accidentally shoot him.
“I could have died,” he testified.
Defense attorney Steve Schwartz pointed out his client was in a red Jeep with a lady for 20 minutes and came over to the car before driving away.
“He had no confrontation with you,” Schwartz said, and the witness said that was true.
The second witness said he was 10 at the time of the robbery, but has since turned 11. He also testified they were on the way to his house and stopped at the park. He said his friend got robbed and a gun was pulled on his friend by one person, a white, short person. He said three were there and two had guns — the white person and the tall, black male.
They started patting down his friend and asking for money. His friend’s phone was taken by the tall black male.
He said a white male pointed a gun at him and he was backing up, trying to get away. The tall black male patted him down. He said his phone was thrown down when he said it had a tracker.
Then, he testified, the three all ran to the grey/blackish Challenger and pulled out to Belleville Road, stopping at the stop sign, and then drove away fast, “over the speed limit.”
He identified Delaney as the driver of the car.
Defense attorney Schwartz cross-examined the second boy witness and the boy agreed Delaney didn’t do anything to him. The boy agreed Delaney got out of the red Jeep after about 20 minutes, talked to the three teens, and then got in the Challenger. He identified Delaney as the driver because he could see him through the front window.
The final witness was Van Buren Township Police Sgt. Jeff Stanton, who was a detective at the time of the robbery and the officer in charge of the case.
Sgt. Stanton testified that he interviewed Delaney on April 25 in the police interview room. He went through the procedure of reading Delaney his Miranda Rights and Delaney waived the right to an attorney.
Delaney’s signed statement was entered as exhibit #1 in the case. In the statement Delaney said he was hanging out and his ex’s mom pulled up and he got in her car and talked to her for a while and then he wanted to leave. He saw his two friends coming toward him and they said, “Let’s go. Go. Go. Drive.”
The statement said they told him they took one of the kid’s phones and pointed a gun at him and, “I said we needed to give it back.”
But he said he was in a hurry because he needed to drop off a friend in Belleville and then another to get his clothes for work and then take him to work.
He said, at last, when he went home to Ypsilanti, he found a BB gun under the seat and took it back to the owner.
He said he had no intentions to do wrong. He gave police permission to search his phone.
The Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor made a motion to bind Delaney over for trial and defense attorney Schwartz said his client could be charged with accessory after the fact, at best. He said Delaney was talking to someone in another car and then went straight to his car. He didn’t know what had happened, Schwartz said.
The prosecutor said it was clear he agreed to be part of an armed robbery and at the very minimum it was accessory after the fact. He said when he later finds the weapon he gives the person back his gun instead of turning it over to the police.
Judge Green bound Delany over to the higher court for trial. He is free on $10,000 personal recognizance bond.
Joshua Michael Bright
Joshua Michael Bright, 28, waived his preliminary exam on felonious assault and weapons charges in VBT on May 31. He was bound over to circuit court for an arraignment on the information July 18. His personal recognizance bond of $5,000 was continued and he wore a GPS tether. Judge Green said he cannot go to 321 Holly Lane.