Judge orders trial in murder case
EVANS CITY — A tapping on the window outside his Adams Township rental home in the early morning hours of Jan. 22 drew 18-year-old Jeremy C. Hughes Jr.'s curiosity.
The voices demanding, “Open up. Open up,” moments later, drew his concern.
Hughes walked to the window and peeked out.
“I saw a gun in my face,” the teenager recalled. “It was pointed directly at me.”
He retrieved his shotgun while his roommate, Daniel C. Oliverio, 20, grabbed a handgun. The two tenants at the 141 Downieville Road duplex retreated to the back of their apartment.
They “took cover” behind a door and a corner of wall, Hughes said, as the two unknown intruders dressed in black forced in the front door and opened fire.
A shootout followed with up to 15 rounds exchanged, Hughes recounted.
When it was over in 20 seconds, maybe less, Hughes had a superficial gunshot wound to his stomach, possibly from the fragment of one of the fired bullets.
One of the intruders, Jason T. McIntyre, 24, of Kittanning, lay dead on the steps outside the house, where he fell while trying to flee the gunfire.
Hughes, in a soft voice, told his story before a packed courtroom gathered for a preliminary hearing Tuesday at the office of District Judge Wayne Seibel in Evans City.
Seated nearby, dressed in prison-issued orange hooded sweatshirts and red sweatsuits, defendants McKinley W. Berry, 24, of Ford City, and Jacob M. Adams, 24, of Kittanning listened quietly.
At times, Berry scowled and shook his head in apparent disbelief during Hughes' testimony.
Seibel at the end of the nearly two-hour hearing ordered Berry and Adams to stand trial on charges of second-degree murder, robbery, burglary and conspiracy to commit the crimes of felony murder and robbery.Berry also was held for court on charges of aggravated assault and reckless endangerment.Both defendants are in the Butler County Prison on $1 million bail each.Police suspect the Armstrong County trio — Berry, Adams and McIntyre — traveled to Adams Township to rob Hughes and Oliverio of marijuana and money.In his testimony, Hughes acknowledged that Adams was a repeat customer, having visited the Downieville Road home to “buy weed” on at least two prior occasions.Police suspect the three men plotted their marijuana rip-off scheme at a Kittanning area bar before driving to Butler County.Police said they parked their car a block away from the targeted house where Hughes, Oliverio and a visiting friend, Wade J. Brueckman of Connoquenessing Township were watching television and smoking marijuana.While Adams, the alleged getaway driver, stayed in the vehicle, police allege, Berry and McIntyre — dressed in dark hooded sweatshirts and gloves to conceal their identities — walked to the home.The attire worked. Hughes said he did not recognize either man.Gunfire rang out as soon as the two strangers burst into the house. McIntyre, according to testimony, was first in.Both tenants were already in armed defensive positions. Brueckman took refuge in the bathroom, hiding in the bathtub.Hughes believed he was hit by one of the first shots. But during cross-examination, he told Berry's attorney, Joseph Kecskemethy, that he never specifically saw either defendant shoot at him.“I just heard it,” he said.
He also couldn't tell Kecskemethy how many shots he fired from his shotgun.“I honestly couldn't say,” Hughes said. “I don't remember. Maybe twice.”He thought Oliverio fired two or three rounds from his .45-caliber pistol.In all, Hughes guessed he heard “10 to 15” gunshots. The shooting was over in 15 to 20 seconds, he said during questioning by prosecutor Russ Karl, a county assistant district attorney.Both intruders left the home. About 30 seconds later, Hughes, Oliverio and Brueckman headed out the door, too, but not before gathering up some belongings.The property, which apparently included marijuana, was stuffed in a duffel bag.Hughes said when he ran out of the home and down the steps he saw one of the intruders — later identified as McIntyre.“I just saw him laying there,” he testified on cross-examination when asked if he believed the man was dead. “I didn't even look at him. I just ran around him.”An autopsy subsequently determined McIntyre died of a 12-gauge shotgun slug to his chest, apparently fired from Hughes' long gun.Berry made it out of the house safely and met up with Adams, according to police. They eventually drove back to Armstrong County.The next day, however, both were under arrest after police learned from McIntyre's family that the dead man and the two defendants had been together the previous night.Hughes said he, Oliverio and Brueckman also drove away in his car.They traveled just down the road and stopped when they thought it was safe, Hughes told attorney Kimberly Hudak, one of two public defenders who represented Adams at the hearing.They first called Oliverio's aunt, who arrived and picked them up. They next spoke to Oliverio's mother, who called a lawyer, Hughes testified.He admitted they never contacted police.Police were first alerted by a neighbor, who said she heard gunshots.Trooper Max DeLuca said crime-scene investigators collected shell casings and removed slugs from walls in and around the house.That evidence, he said, appeared to be from four weapons — a 12-gauge shotgun and .45-caliber, .380-caliber and .40-caliber handguns.But Hughes' shotgun and Oliverio's pistol were the only guns police recovered from the shooting.During their separate interviews with investigators, Berry and Adams “put themselves at (the home) when the gunshots were fired,” DeLuca testified.But in court documents, Berry claimed he heard only one shot fired at the house and denied that he had a gun with him. He also said he never saw McIntyre with a gun.Prosecutors, applying Pennsylvania's felony murder rule, charged Berry and Adams with homicide, even though neither fired the fatal shot.Under the law, all participants of a felony can be charged with murder if a homicide occurs. The two felonies leading to the Jan. 22 homicide, authorities said, were burglary and robbery.Prosecutors earlier said that neither Hughes nor Oliverio was charged in the shooting because investigators believed they were defending themselves in their home.Karl and the defense attorneys declined to discuss the case or Tuesday's testimony.But Berry's co-counsel, attorney Kenneth Harris, an associate at Kecskemethy's law firm, said his client grieved for McIntyre's family.“McKinley is deeply saddened by the loss of his friend, Jason,” Harris said. “He extends sympathy to Jason's family for their loss.”
