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County preps case against 3 in robberies, Realtor murder
2 to face death-penalty specifications
YOUNGSTOWN
Prosecutors are preparing to lay out their case against three men accused of targeting real-estate agents for robbery, leaving one woman dead in a burning building on the city’s East Side.
Robert Brooks, 25, of Castalia Avenue, and Grant P. Cooper, 21, of Sulgrave Drive in Brookfield, are charged with aggravated murder, aggravated robbery, kidnapping and aggravated arson with death-penalty specifications in the death of Realtor Vivian Martin.
Paul Brooks, 27, of Youngstown, is charged with aggravated robbery and kidnapping in the robbery of a real-estate agent in Boardman. Paul and Robert Brooks are brothers.
Robert Brooks is set for a pretrial hearing Feb. 17 before Judge James C. Evans of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court. Cooper is set for a pretrial hearing before Judge Evans on Feb. 2. Paul Brooks is scheduled for trial before Judge Evans on March 28.
Prosecutors this week filed a bill of particulars detailing how the state believes the robbery and murder took place. Prosecutors also have filed a lengthy list of potential witnesses against the three men.
According to the bill of particulars filed by prosecutors Wednesday, Cooper and Robert Brooks went to a home at 3660 Nelson Ave. listed for sale with Essence Realty, owned by Martin, on Sept. 20, with plans to detain, rob and kill the woman. The bill states that the men brought duct tape and an “incendiary liquid” to the house as proof of the men’s intentions.
A coroner’s report has stated that Martin died of strangulation. The bill of particulars makes it clear that prosecutors believe Cooper and Robert Brooks committed the strangulation “by choking her with his body” — whose body is not specified — until she stopped breathing.
Prosecutors, in the bill of particulars, also mention that Martin was beaten and threatened by the men before she was murdered and left in the burning building.
A second bill of particulars filed in the case deals with the alleged robbery of another real-estate agent in Boardman five days before Martin was murdered.
In the second filing, prosecutors say the Brooks brothers met another female real-estate agent at an apartment on Hillman Way in Boardman, held a gun to the woman’s head and robbed her. The filing says the two brothers took the woman’s keys and a Bible from her car containing $4.
The filing said that the woman was told not to leave the apartment until after the men fled or she and all the people listed in her cell phone would be killed.
There also does not appear to be a shortage of witnesses against the accused men. A witness list from the prosecutor’s office includes 20 Youngstown police officers, two Brookfield police officers, 19 Youngstown firefighters, banking officials, five Boardman police officers, cell-phone-company officials, representatives of the coroner’s office and others.