Syracuse, NY - Three Syracuse residents were indicted today on charges they participated in a gun-trafficking conspiracy involving illegal handguns bought in Ohio to be resold here. One of the guns identified in the conspiracy indictment was linked to another city resident who was killed during a shootout with Syracuse police at a North Geddes Street residence in November. One...
Syracuse, NY - Three Syracuse residents were indicted today on charges they participated in a gun-trafficking conspiracy involving illegal handguns bought in Ohio to be resold here.
One of the guns identified in the conspiracy indictment was linked to another city resident who was killed during a shootout with Syracuse police at a North Geddes Street residence in November.
One of the accused conspirators, Shawndell Everson, is accused of selling the .357 magnum revolver with scope to Charles Jennings two days before the Nov. 8 shootout at 207 N. Geddes St. The indictment does not indicate exactly where that gun came from although other weapons identified in the indictment were reported to have been bought in Cleveland and driven in rental cars to Syracuse to be resold.
Everson, 32, of 313 Village Drive, Apt. 14, was indicted today on five counts each of second- and third-degree criminal possession of a weapon, four counts of third-degree criminal sale of a firearm, two counts each of fifth-degree criminal sale and fifth-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, two counts of first-degree robbery and one count of fourth-degree conspiracy.
Courtney Everson, 20, of 325 Park St., Apt. 2, was indicted on three counts of second-degree criminal possession of a weapon and single counts of fourth-degree conspiracy and fifth-degree criminal sale and fifth-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance.
Melissa Ricks, 21, of the same Park Street address, was indicted on single counts of fourth-degree conspiracy and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon.
The indictment accuses the trio of traveling to Cleveland April 25 to buy a .22-caliber handgun which was brought back to New York concealed in the engine compartment of a rental car. That car and the defendants were stopped by police on the New York State Thruway in the Waterloo area in Seneca County April 26.
The indictment indicates the Eversons also traveled to Cleveland April 18 and 19 in a rented gold-colored Malibu to buy three handguns from an unindicted co-conspirator. According to the indictment, the suspects had to try and locate that same rental car several days later after they were forced to leave a .45-caliber handgun in the vehicle.
Charles JenningsShawndell Everson is the only defendant charged in the indictment in connection with the gun sold to Jennings.
The indictment accuses Shawndell Everson of meeting with Jennings on Nov. 6, then traveling to Syracuse’s North Side to get the gun and scope and then returning to turn the gun over to Jennings.
About 10 p.m. Nov. 8, Jennings forced his way into the North Geddes Street building, threatened three adult male residents with a gun and began pistol-whipping them. When city police officers arrived on the scene, there was an exchange of gunfire between the officers and Jennings, first from an upstairs window and then from a ground-floor doorway.
View full sizeCrime scene and investigation photos from 207 N Geddes St., where Charles Jennings was killed by Syracuse police after a standoff in 2009.After police succeeded in freeing the last of seven hostages from the building, officers found Jennings dead on the floor inside the doorway. Officials said Jennings had the .357 magnum revolver in his hand when he died.
None of the police officers was injured and a county grand jury concluded the officers acted appropriately in returning the gunfire at the scene of the home-invasion robbery where Jennings was killed.
First Chief Assistant District Attorney Rick Trunfio today verified the gun recovered with Jennings’ body was the weapon identified in the indictment as having been sold to him by Everson. But he said authorities are still investigating to see if that weapon also was linked to the gun pipeline from Cleveland.
Federal authorities and law enforcement in Cleveland also have investigations ongoing in the matter, Trunfio said.
The two robbery charges in the indictment accuse Shawndell Everson of staging armed holdups on Jan. 30 and Nov. 23, 2008. The 2008 robbery involved employees of the Wingz restaurant on Nottingham Road being held up as they left work. The indictment does not indicate where the weapons used in those robberies originated.
Shawndell Everson is well known to local authorities.
In 1996, he was sentenced to 21 years in state prison for participating in a holdup during which Marie Johnson, 67, was fatally shot at the social club she ran in the basement of her South State Street home.
Everson was freed from prison in March 2006 after the district attorney’s office agreed to have his murder conviction set aside on the grounds he had been denied effective assistance of counsel.