By Rich Bockmann
The borough’s district attorney said three juries returned guilty verdicts in three separate murder cases within hours of each other earlier this month — a first in his memory.
“Yesterday was truly a great day for the people of New York — and especially for the people of Queens County — who can feel secure that these defendants are now behind bars and facing lengthy prison terms,” District Attorney Richard Brown said Dec. 6. “I can’t remember a day when so many juries have spoken so loudly, so clearly and in unison about their abhorrence for the senseless killing of other human beings.”
In the first case, a Supreme Court jury found 36-year-old Damel Burton guilty of murdering a man in his apartment at the Baisley Park Houses in South Jamaica and then walking onto a city bus where he senselessly opened fire on riders, the DA said.
On Dec. 2, 2011, Burton shot Keith Murrell in his chest inside his apartment, Brown said. Murrell ran into his room, closed the door and jumped out his second-story window to a grassy area below. Brown said he was pronounced dead at Jamaica Hospital later that day.
According to testimony from his four-week trial, Burton then climbed onto the Q111 bus and fatally shot Marvin Gilkes in the back of the head, the DA said and opened fire on a third victim who had to undergo surgery for the gunshot wound to his mouth and face.
Brown said Burton faces up to 50 years to life in prison at his sentencing, scheduled for Dec. 19.
A jury in the Queens Supreme Court house that day also found Muhammad Iqbal, a 49-year-old Brooklyn resident, guilty of killing his girlfriend and dumping her body near the Montefiore Cemetery in Cambria Heights.
Brown said Iqbal got into a fight with his girlfriend, Khadija Mahel, one afternoon in April 2010 and strangled her with an extension cord. The next night her wrapped her body in a carpet and drove to 228th Street and Francis Lewis Boulevard, where he dumped her body, the district attorney said.
He was found guilty after a three-week trial and faces up to 25 years to life in prison at his sentencing, set for Jan. 22.
In the third case, a jury of Kereim Richardson’s peers found him guilty of shooting two men he was playing dice with in the back room of a South Richmond Hill barber shop, killing one of them, Brown said.
Some time after midnight Dec. 29, 2010, witnesses saw Richardson, 34, walk into the Liberty Avenue shop’s bathroom with Gary Bowlin, the DA said.
Shots were fired and Bowlin fell to the floor with gunshot wounds to his head and torso. One of the dice players then grabbed Richardson and the two got into a scuffle. Richardson then shot the man twice, once in the nose, Brown said.
He faces up to 25 years to life in prison at his sentencing, scheduled for Jan. 6.
Reach reporter Rich Bockmann by e-mail at rbockmann@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4574.
