His next court appearance is Monday.

His next court appearance is Monday.

STAFF Report

WARREN — The man Warren police barely knew a week ago now faces a 13-count indictment charging him with aggravated murder and other charges that could land him on Death Row if he is convicted.

A Trumbull County grand jury Thursday indicted Ardeen I. Mitchell, 28, of Youngstown, on charges stemming from the shooting death of Fred A. DeVengencie, the 89-year-old owner of Freddie’s Diner on North Park Avenue in Warren Aug. 12.

The charges also accuse Mitchell of aggravating circumstances of killing DeVengencie while in the act of robbing him and kidnapping him, and while trying to kill two or more people at the same time.

Any of those circumstances make it possible for Mitchell to face the death penalty if convicted.

Warren police and officers with the U.S. Marshals Service arrested Mitchell on a warrant at around 3 p.m. Saturday at a female friend’s home in Warren.

The warrant was issued after DNA from the blood on a liquor bottle collected at the scene was matched with Mitchell’s blood at a lab run by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation.

Mitchell’s DNA was on file because he had spent time in prison recently, having been released in January for a robbery he committed in Sharon in 2002.

Police said Mitchell had been arrested in Warren in February after a chase from Niles into Warren, but no leads in the investigation into DeVengencie’s death turned up Mitchell’s name before DNA identified him.

DeVengencie’s son, Anthony, 71, was also shot during the robbery and critically injured. Family members say he is stable. Both DeVengencies are from Warren.

The indictment also accuses Mitchell of robbing two employees in the diner that day.

Mitchell is being held in Trumbull County Jail. He is not eligible to be released on bond.

He will be arraigned on the charges at 11 a.m. Monday before Judge John M. Stuard of Trumbull County Common Pleas Court, who has been assigned the case.