Disparate views on criminal justice at center of theft cases

Sep. 20—DANVERS — It started as a flash mob style shoplifting at a Danvers menswear store, after five young Boston residents charged in and grabbed an armful of Canada Goose parkas. But it quickly escalated into a robbery, one that left an elderly store employee with broken teeth and other injuries.

In the days after the Dec. 26, 2019, incident at Giblee's on Route 114, the case was used as an example to challenge some of the tenets of criminal justice reform advocates, including the chief prosecutor in Suffolk County, where all five were from, who had vowed during her campaign not to prosecute crimes like shoplifting.

The store's owner said after that he'd lost roughly $40,000 to shoplifters who targeted the coats in 2018 and 2019, and the Dec. 26 incident was the third in two weeks.

Now, a Salem Superior Court judge is weighing highly disparate requests from a prosecutor, who wants him to send all five to jail, and from lawyers for the five — including one who on Monday continued to characterize the incident as a shoplifting.

"It makes me wonder what's the motivation to send this to a grand jury so quickly," lawyer Alicia Andrews told Judge Salim Tabit on Monday. Andrews, who represents Mekeda McKenzie, 20, questioned why Essex County prosecutors went "to the grand jury so quickly over a $1,000 coat?"

"What about the man who was injured?" Tabit shot back in a raised voice.

During the 90-minute "lobby" conference Monday, Tabit told lawyers for the five — which also includes Bryon Vaughn, 25, of Dorchester, Lynasja Trimble, 22, and Kashawnii Ruomo-O'Brien, 21, of Mattapan, and Adriana James, 24, of Jamaica Plain — that he doesn't believe the five set out to engage in violence that day.

But that's what happened.

Prosecutor Erin Bellavia told the judge how the defendants "rolled in, five deep," with a plan to grab as many coats as possible, stationing one as a lookout.

When the store's owner, Alan Gibeley, and another employee tried to intervene, the group got into a "tug of war" over the coats.

"Frankly, my sense is that the recommendation from Ms. Bellavia, under the circumstances, is incredibly reasonable," said Tabit, referring to the prosecutor's requests for 18-month jail terms for McKenzie and James — who were both believed to have been involved in an earlier incident at Giblee's — and 12 months in jail for Vaughn, Ruomo-O'Brien and Trimble.

James' attorney, Thomas Pierce, asked the judge to impose a sentence of time served in the case.

But lawyers for the other defendants asked the judge to continue the cases without a finding — a little-used disposition in Superior Court — and then dismiss them, saying they are hoping to preserve their records from a felony conviction.

Tabit expressed concern with the message that would send, however.

"My biggest concern is for general deterrence," said Tabit. "There needs to be an appreciation that these are serious offenses. We're not going to brush them aside as if they mean nothing."

The judge went on to ask all five defense attorneys to come up with potential conditions of probation that would make it meaningful — such as community service, letters of apology, and other penalties that say "we're not going to allow people to simply steal, rob and take what they want without consequence."

Probation alone, said the judge, "doesn't give me the sense the defendants appreciate how serious this is, and it doesn't tell the person whose teeth were broken and who suffers from PTSD that we are serious about this."

Trimble's attorney, Christopher Norris, said he's already persuaded her to begin performing community service on her own, through Project Cope, and was willing to have her meet or write to the victims with an apology. But Norris questioned the amount of deterrence a sentence could provide, pointing out that the sentence might only receive coverage in a local paper.

Other attorneys said a felony conviction — or any conviction at all — would likely hinder educational and job prospects. Ruomo-O'Brien's attorney, Joseph Smith, said his client is a senior at Lasell University who hopes to pursue a career in psychology.

Tabit said he will also review video of the incident, which received national attention, and any additional information the lawyers want to provide, before coming up with a potential sentence.

The five defendants could still seek to go to trial if they are unhappy with the judge's proposal.

Tabit said he will tell the lawyers on Nov. 18 what he is proposing if the five plead guilty.

Courts reporter Julie Manganis can be reached at 978-338-2521, by email at jmanganis@salemnews.com or on Twitter at @SNJulieManganis