Slaying suspect, 20, faces 2 other charges
Posted on Tuesday, July 22, 2008
A 20-year-old Little Rock man accused with his two brothers of killing a 6-year-old girl was formally charged Monday with unrelated counts of firearm possession and armed robbery.
Ricky Dale Smith is scheduled to be arraigned today with his 21-year-old brother, Marqus Tyrell Smith, on a capital murder charge in the December slaying of Kamya Weathersby. The girl was killed in her bed at her Martin Luther King Jr. Drive home in a hail of gunfire four days after Christmas.
The men’s half-brother, 18-year-old Kevin Lawrence Banks, was arrested in January. Banks is to stand trial in the killing in September.
Ricky Smith was arrested on the murder charge May 20. According to court filings, he and two Little Rock teenagers are accused of robbing a North Little Rock Shell station the day before his arrest. Smith is charged with aggravated robbery in the holdup. Special Circuit Judge Bill Luppen set a January trial date in that case at Smith’s arraignment Monday.
The teenagers, 14-year-old Larry Dell Taylor 3 rd and 17-year-old Isaiah Darrell Chandler, also are charged with aggravated robbery and face a second set of aggravated robbery charges on accusations the pair held up a Little Rock Shell station a couple of hours before the North Little Rock robbery. The teens have confessed to both robberies, according to arrest reports. The judge also set a January trial date for a felon in possession of a firearm charge against Smith which stems from his March 13 arrest by Little Rock police. According to court records, Smith, with co-defendant John Kenneth Porchia Jr., 19, was arrested after a traffic stop in the 2700 block of Cross Street. Records show that a Beretta. 40-caliber semiautomatic pistol was found under a car seat near Smith, and police found Porchia 1 with 1 / 2 grams of cocaine, 2 grams of marijuana, one PCP-dipped cigar and a loaded Lorcin. 380-caliber semiautomatic handgun.
Porchia was charged with simultaneous possession of drugs and firearms and possession of a controlled substance with intent to distribute, both felonies. Porchia currently is awaiting sentencing after pleading guilty in June to federal charges of trafficking in crack cocaine near a school from an April 2007 incident.
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