MURDER CHARGE Suspect arrested in 2004 homicide

Four others arrested in the case are in Mahoning County Jail awaiting trial.
YOUNGSTOWN -- U.S. marshals have arrested the fifth suspect in the April 2004 homicide of Efrin Brown, 26, of Gladstone Street.
Cedric V. Philips, 20, was taken into custody after a short vehicle chase outside Charlotte, N.C., around 2 p.m. Wednesday, said Dean Michael, coordinator of the Northern Ohio Violent Fugitive Task Force.
Phillips is from the Charlotte area but had been living on Kendis Circle in Youngstown around the time of Brown's death.
Brown was found shot to death in a vacant apartment on Kendis Circle on April 16, 2004, three days after his family reported him missing.
Phillips and four others, including three women, were indicted by a Mahoning County grand jury in May of this year on charges of aggravated murder with a gun specification and aggravated robbery.
The other four, Craig Owens, 22, of Coitsville; Denise Jackson, 21, of Kendis Circle; Lachonna D. Tarver, 25, of Kendis Circle; and Taryse Ingram, no age given, of Kendis Circle, remain in the Mahoning County Jail awaiting trial, said assistant county prosecutor Martin Desmond.
Trials have been delayed as the prosecution is awaiting the results of DNA testing on some evidence from the crime scene, Desmond said.
Michael said the Northern Ohio Violent Fugitive Task Force, which is run by the U.S. Marshals Service, was brought into the case to help find Phillips. The FBI's Violent Crimes Task Force assisted in the investigation, he said.
Phillips was in the Mecklenburg County Jail in Charlotte on Wednesday awaiting extradition, Michael said.
The aggravated-murder charge carries a maximum sentence of life in prison upon conviction. Aggravated robbery carries a maximum term of 10 years. The gun specification would add three years to any sentence.