2 men get 220-year terms in Indianapolis quadruple killing
Mar 31, 2023, 1:11 PM
FILE - Officers walk out of the apartment complex where four people, one woman and three men, were found dead in Indianapolis, Feb. 5, 2020. Two men convicted of murder and other charges in the fatal Indianapolis shootings of three young men and a young woman were both sentenced Friday, March 31, 2023, to 220 years in prison. (Grace Hollars/The Indianapolis Star via AP, File)
Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS
(Grace Hollars/The Indianapolis Star via AP, File)
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Two men convicted of murder and other charges in the fatal Indianapolis shootings of three young men and a young woman were both sentenced Friday to 220 years in prison.
Cameron Banks and Desmond Banks were sentenced after being convicted in early March of four counts each of murder, felony murder and robbery resulting in serious bodily injury following a five-day trial.
A third co-defendant, Lasean Watkins, was convicted on the same charges, but his Friday sentencing was reset for April 28 and he was appointed a new attorney.
The charges stem from the February 2020 shooting deaths of three men — Marcel Wills, 20; Braxton Ford, 21; and Jalen Roberts, 19 — and a woman, Kimari Hunt, 21. The victims’ bodies were found in a ransacked Indianapolis apartment.
“This case serves as a tragic reminder of the lasting effects of gun violence,” Marion County Prosecutor Ryan Mears said in a statement announcing Friday’s sentences.
WXIN-TV reported that Cameron Banks and Desmond Banks are brothers and that they, Watkins and another suspect ransacked the apartment and cleaned out a safe after more than 50 rounds were fired inside it during the killings.
A fourth suspect, Rodrience Anderson, pleaded guilty last October to four counts of robbery resulting in serious bodily injury while agreeing to cooperate with the prosecution. He is scheduled to be sentenced April 3.
