OPINION:
How Daeyon Ross went from jailed felon facing new gun charges to a free man accused of a murderous carjacking spree is a story that started with a scandal at the Metropolitan Police Department and ended with a Biden-appointed prosecutor deciding to drop scores of cases, including Mr. Ross’.
Police say Mr. Ross on July 2 shot and killed Kurt Modeste as the father of four was at a McDonald’s drive-thru. Minutes later, Mr. Ross shot and killed two dogs in another carjacked vehicle. Mr. Modeste, a 24-year Metrobus driver, was returning to his La Plata, Maryland, home after church and had stopped to buy food for his brother, who has multiple sclerosis and is bedridden, ABC 7 News reported.
Mr. Ross picked up crime early in life. The Trump Justice Department put out a press release in 2018 telling of how Mr. Ross, then 16, was sentenced to five years in prison for Metro robberies at knifepoint. Released, he was arrested and jailed in 2022.
His freedom came when the office of Matthew Graves, U.S. attorney for D.C., began dropping a number of gun cases because Washington officers in crime suppression units, like the one that arrested Mr. Ross, are suspected of wrongdoing.
Mr. Graves is best known these days as the man who refused to prosecute Hunter Biden for tax fraud for the two years he lived in the nation’s capital, according to IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley, who made the case against President Biden’s son.
Mr. Graves is a Biden donor appointed by the president. In that respect, his resume is apart from the roster of elected urban Democratic prosecutors whose local campaigns were financed with millions of dollars from left-wing billionaire George Soros.
From Los Angeles to San Francisco to Manhattan, the Soros cadre has declined to enforce basic laws against theft and robbery, creating inducements to steal without consequence. The aftermath has ruined neighborhoods as retailers close for good.
D.C. is suffering through a sharp rise in carjackings. They are up 92% his year compared with the same period in 2022. Homicide is up 19%; violent crime 30%.
Less than two months after serving five years in imprison, at age 22, Mr. Ross was walking the streets of Southeast last Aug. 11 when officers in the 7th Police District, Sector 2, spotted him, according to a police affidavit filed in D.C. Superior Court and reviewed by The Washington Times.
Sector 2 was ridden with crime in just the past week: two homicides, five assaults with a deadly weapon, three robberies. Officers had seized 80 guns so far that year.
When Mr. Ross spotted the officers, he ran, then pulled a 9 mm handgun and threw it to the ground, police say. Apprehended, Mr. Ross was jailed on four gun charges. As a felon, he is prohibited under D.C. law from licensing and carrying a gun.
A judge ruled Aug. 19 that Mr. Ross posed a “significant danger” to society, according to a court order reviewed by The Times. Mr. Graves’ office, which sought the no-bail ruling, brought a five-count indictment on Sept. 29.
But then the criminal justice process tilted Mr. Ross’ way, providing, in effect, a death sentence for Kurt Modeste, a devoted family man.
D.C. police held a press conference to announce the 7th District suppression team was under investigation.
Mr. Graves’ office then sent an email to Molly Bunke, Mr. Ross’ attorney, informing her of pretrial “Brady rule” issues that require prosecutors to provide defendants with any information that would tend to exonerate them.
On Oct. 17, Ms. Bunke filed a five-page memo. Mr. Graves’ office responded, according to her letter, that some of the officers who arrested Mr. Ross were under investigation for misconduct: taking a gun from a suspect but not making an arrest and writing up a report inconsistent with body-camera footage. In the Ross case, officers did, in fact, make an arrest and seized his gun.
The day after Ms. Bunke’s filing, Mr. Graves dropped the case. And Mr. Ross walked free.
House Republicans have painted Mr. Graves as a Soros-like softy. They joined the DC Police Union in saying that Mr. Graves too often declines to prosecute criminals.
He was summoned to a May hearing, where he defended his statistical record.
Two months later, on the first Sunday in July, Mr. Ross launched his one-man rampage across Prince George’s County, Maryland, and into Washington for a last stand, according to a Prince’s George’s County police account.
In Capitol Heights, he started with a Honda CRV at gunpoint, then crashed it. He ran to the McDonald’s, picked out an Acura ILX and fatally shot Mr. Modeste. Mr. Ross then selected a Toyota Scion there.
The dogs inside didn’t have a chance. Police say they finally arrested him in Washington after he stole a fourth vehicle.
Prince George’s police charged him with first-degree murder, carjacking and animal cruelty.
“It’s extremely rare to come across an individual who has such a disregard for life,” said acting Deputy Chief Zachary O’Lare, according to WUSA, Washington‘s CBS affiliate.
I asked Mr. Graves’ office about the decision to free Mr. Ross.
“We do not comment on charging decisions,” said spokesperson Patricia Hartman. “When our Office learned of the 7D Crime Suppression Team investigation, we began a case-specific assessment of impacted pending cases. Where we believe that we have sufficient admissible evidence to prove an illegal gun possession case at trial beyond a reasonable doubt, we will bring charges and try that case.”
* Article From: The Washington Times
