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Bond set at $10 million each for suspects in West Side homicide
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
Prosecutors said Monday they believe a pair of suspects in a homicide Friday on the West Side were getting ready to leave town.
Assistant City Prosecutor Jeffrey Moliterno told Judge Elizabeth Kobly during arraignments for Dashonti Baker, 24 and Barraya Hickson, also 24, both of Millet Avenue, that when officers found a car they are suspected of using just a couple of hours after Rae’venna Faircloth-Thomas, 24, was found murdered on Oneta Street, the trunk was full of clothes as if they were getting ready to run.
Moliterno asked for a significant bond, even higher than usual for murder cases, because of what he said was evidence that the two were going to flee. Judge Kobly agreed, setting bond at $10 million apiece for Baker and Hickson.
Faircloth-Thomas was found shot to death about 12:30 p.m. Friday after officers responded to a call of shots fired at an SUV parked in front of a home on Oneta Street.
Moliterno said witnesses told police they saw Baker run from the SUV into a waiting car that had a broken window covered by a blanket. A Community Police Unit officer was familiar with the car and led detectives to a home in the first block of Millet Avenue, where the car was found parked behind a home that appeared to be vacant.
The home was raided by Community Police Unit and vice squad members in May when they served a search warrant investigating drug activity. Baker was in the home at the time and was indicted Thursday by a grand jury on charges relating to that raid.
When police found the car, they also found a shell casing inside it, Moliterno said. Hickson and Baker were both with the car when police arrived and were taken to the detective bureau for questioning. They were arrested a few hours later. Baker is charged with aggravated murder, and Hickson is charged with complicity to commit aggravated murder.
Moliterno said Hickson, who has no criminal record, was evasive when questioned by detectives, and she would not provide them with an address. She told Judge Kobly she lived at the same home that Baker listed as his address and where the search warrant was served last month.
Moliterno said investigators also found a quit claim deed inside the SUV Faircloth-Thomas was found in that showed she deeded a property on East Warren Avenue home to Baker on June 7. Moliterno did not say whether that deed was connected to the murder.