CHARLESTON, W.Va – Testimony is underway in the trial of Barack Williams, the teenager charged with first-degree murder and first-degree robbery in the incident that resulted in the shooting death of tobacco store clerk Caden Martin.
Martin was shot and killed during the robbery by Bre’juan Williams-Hampton, the other teenager charged in the case who pleaded guilty last year, and prosecutors say Williams acted as a lookout at the Tobacco and Vape store on 7th Avenue in Charleston.
“The evidence will show that the two 14-year-olds planned the robbery together with defendant Barack Howard Williams to serve as the lookout while Bre’juan Williams-Hampton took a pistol into the store to steal vapes,” Kanawha County assistant prosecuting attorney Madison Tuck said during her opening statement before Judge Maryclaire Akers Thursday.
Williams is charged with murder because West Virginia law states that a person is responsible if a death occurs during the commission of a dangerous felony.His defense attorney, Herb Hively, laid out a different picture in which Williams was a bystander to Williams-Hampton’s actions.
Hively said during his opening statement that the two teens attempted to buy wraps to smoke marijuana from the store and, after being refused service as minors, returned later that evening to try again in hopes of finding a more sympathetic clerk. Hively argued that based on statements made by Williams-Hampton during his court proceedings, Barack Williams had no knowledge of a plan to rob the store.
“September 29 at his plea hearing, (Williams-Hampton) said, ‘I killed him,’ and under direct questioning from the judge, he said, ‘I don’t know why.’ He didn’t say, ‘I had a plan. This was part of a conspiracy.’ He said, ‘I don’t know why,'” he said.
The defense’s opening statement painted Williams as a troubled teenager caught up with the wrong company, describing the defendant’s circumstances of being suspended from Westside Middle School and living with his father in north Charleston.
Hively said Williams’ youth led him down the wrong path.
“At some point when you get older, 64, 44, you realize who your friends are, and you’d like to sit down with your dad, sit down with your mom, but at 14, a mean friend, a brutal friend, is sometimes better than no friends,” he said.
The prosecution pointed to evidence shown later during the proceedings as signs of Williams’ willing participation in the robbery of Tobacco and Vape. Tuck stressed evidence that she said indicates Williams reached inside the store and stole ice cream bars from a freezer that were eaten in his garage seemingly mere moments after Caden Martin was killed.
“The evidence will further show that the defendant, Barack Howard Williams, dutifully stood at the door serving as the lookout, observing what happened both inside and outside of the store and even reaching into the store to grab himself some ice cream bars from the cooler beside the door,” she said.
Tuck indicated that during the trial, Williams-Hampton would testify on behalf of the prosecution.
She also described an alleged series of events in the days leading up to Martin’s death in which the two teens were accused of shooting a woman to steal her bike and attempting to rob another man at gunpoint.
Witnesses providing testimony Thursday morning included Kanawha County Sheriff’s Deputy DJ Dorsey, Tobacco and Vape owner Qusay Imair, and Charleston Police detectives William Lovern and Joshua Simmons.
Dorsey was one of the first law enforcement officers to respond to the store, while Lovern served as lead investigator on the case, and Simmons is part of the department’s crime scene unit.
Testimony indicated that Dorsey and another officer were informed of potential suspicious activity at Tobacco and Vape and, upon arrival, found glass shattered by a bullet and Martin unconscious behind the counter. Dorsey said after securing the area, he called medics and Charleston police, as the location was within the city’s jurisdiction.
The medics that arrived pronounced Martin dead at the scene.
Lovern was questioned by Tuck during the viewing of surveillance video from Tobacco and Vape on the night of January 30, 2024. He described the scene as Williams-Hampton pulled the trigger.
“The victim, Caden Martin putting his hands up, and now you see Bre’juan Williams-Hampton holding a pistol, pointing it towards him. On the left, you see the defendant looking in, opening the door,” he said.
Simmons assisted in conducting a canine trace that led investigators past Williams’ home, and an interaction with neighbors led to a search of the garage. Inside, they found a gun and vapes with packaging matching those in the surveillance footage, a backpack matching the one carried by Williams-Hampton, and ice cream bar wrappers matching the ones taken from the store.
Testimony is expected to continue into Friday.