Commonwealth v. Brown

Facts

On October 22, 2009, the defendant was a passenger in a vehicle with his friends Hernandez, Hill, and Doby. At one point, Hill and Hernandez exited the vehicle with a handgun and mugged two women. Hernandez then stopped at a friends house and changed his shirt. Later that day, the four men met again at the defendant’s apartment. Hernandez stashed the gun in a kitchen cabinet and Hill borrowed a sweatshirt from defendant to attempt to use an ATM card from the earlier mugging. At approximately 12:15 AM, Jamal and Karon McDougal visited the apartment. A man named Silva also arrived. Jamal asked Hernandez if he wanted to participate in robbing someone who owed money to one of Jamal’s friends. Silva agreed to be the getaway driver and Hernandez urged that they commit the robbery immediately. Hernandez retrieved his handgun, and asked the defendant for a hooded sweatshirt to hide his face. Jamal and Karon also borrowed sweatshirts from the defendant. Jamal then asked to borrow the defendant’s “burner” gun, promising that nothing would happen to it. Jamal, Karon, Hernandez, and Silva left the apartment and headed to the victims’ townhouse where they began banging on the front door at 1:00 AM, a man named Tony asked who was there and opened the front door. Jamal and Hernandez chased him up to the second-floor living room where Jamal then threatened him with a gun. Two men, Hector and Staples, then came downstairs and entered the living room. Eventually, Staples, Tony, and Hector all made it upstairs to hide. Jamal and Hernandez followed. kicked in Hector’s door and shot Hector three times, killing him. Tony was also fatally shot.