Baltimore security guard charged with murder, found innocent in other charges
Baltimore MD December 21, 2022
A security guard accused of fatally shooting a man at a Highlandtown bar in November was cleared on Tuesday of all charges stemming from a previous altercation at the same bar.
Baltimore District Judge Kevin Wilson found 39-year-old Keith Mario Luckey not guilty of two counts of second-degree assault and one count of wielding a dangerous weapon.
Prosecutors argued Luckey used undue force when he hit a bar patron with a baton late at night on September 3, breaking two of the man’s fingers and throwing another man to the ground – an altercation that arose when one of the both guests carried a beer from the ChrisT Bar that evening.
But Wilson cautioned the state that, despite citing such evidence, it had not produced any documents, images or video to support the testimony of the two brothers injured that night, Jesus Eduardo Polanco Reyes and Carlos Antonio Peña Reyes.
The Reyes brothers were injured at the same bar where authorities say Luckey gunned down soccer coach Kevin Torres Guerrero on November 7 after Torres threw a brick at Luckey. Although Luckey was acquitted in the assault count, he is being held without bail on the murder charge in Torres’ death.
The killing outraged members of Baltimore’s Latino community, and some officials across Maryland said they could now pay more attention to the industry and introduce legislation to increase state oversight of security forces.
Misael Vasquez and his wife Valerie Caban arrived early for a late night vigil for Kevin Torres, who was fatally shot here by a security guard outside ChrisT Bar. (Amy Davis / Baltimore Sun)
Defense attorney Lawrence Rosenberg, who is representing Luckey in both cases, declined to comment after the trial. Several people attending the trial in support of Luckey in North Avenue Circuit Court on Tuesday cheered as Wilson ruled that he was not guilty.
The Reyes brothers quietly walked away from the courthouse and spoke to a reporter on the courthouse steps, saying they were disappointed with the judge’s verdict. The brothers said they followed up the case, “so that [Luckey] wouldn’t work there anymore.”
Luckey told Polanco Reyes he couldn’t carry a beer bottle outside before the two got together, and Luckey pushed Polanco Reyes in court Tuesday, according to indictment documents and witness statements. The glass bottle shattered when Polanco Reyes fell to the ground, injuring him in multiple places.
At this point, Peña Reyes approached and shoved Luckey, the documents and witness statements showed. Another guard tried to grab Peña Reyes from behind while Luckey pulled out his baton and used it to hit Peña Reyes in the hands three times.
Two bones were fractured in Peña Reyes’ left hand. Polanco Reyes had a laceration on his right arm and lacerations on his right hand. They sought hospital care, leaving the former in a soft cast and the latter requiring stitches. They showed photos of their injuries to a reporter after court—photos that the prosecutor didn’t use as evidence.
Prior to the assault charges, Luckey used a stun gun on a woman in a wheelchair while working for security at a Baltimore pharmacy in June 2020 and arrested an allegedly unruly grocery shopper at a city supermarket in February 2021. He described his use of violence against both women in affidavits against them.
He was a police officer in the Maryland Air National Guard before entering the private security field. During that time, but off duty, he shot and killed a man in the parking lot of a Baltimore County bar around 2 a.m. in July 2019. Baltimore County prosecutors said Luckey was entitled to kill the man who had a gun.
Luckey spoke briefly about his military service when he took the witness stand Tuesday wearing yellow prison scrubs. Sometimes he was combative when the prosecutor asked questions.
Luckey testified Tuesday that Peña Reyes approached him with a clenched fist, which Peña Reyes denied during counter-testimony.
“I hit him with the baton because he attacked me,” Luckey said in court, adding that he “gave verbal commands” and stopped “a threat.”
“When you’re trained with a baton, you can’t just hit someone, you have to give orders,” Luckey said.
When asked by the prosecutor if he was scared, Luckey replied, “Of course he attacked me.”
The question before Wilson was whether Luckey was subjectively afraid of being hurt and whether he used a proportionate amount of force to defend himself.
Assistant prosecutor Karen Sams called Peña Reyes and a police officer who stopped the bar’s patrons about the altercation as witnesses. Originally scheduled for December 15, the trial was postponed because correctional officers failed to bring Luckey to justice.
Sams said officer Franky Arroyo, who wrote the motion to indict Luckey and questioned the Reyes brothers, texted her Tuesday that he was arriving at the courthouse but hadn’t made it to the hallway when the first did both witnesses had finished their testimony. Sams asked Wilson for a short break, but the judge forced her to drop the state’s case without Arroyo’s testimony.
In closing arguments, Sams said It was unreasonable for Luckey to use a gun on Peña Reyes when the bar patron was unarmed. Under the law, Sams said, security guards have the same right to defend themselves as any civilian but no special power to use force.
Sams noted that that night Luckey was wearing a tactical vest that had the word “officer” printed on it the night of the altercation. She described the baton as “an officer’s weapon”.
“The question is, what is permissible as a non-police officer?”
During his closing arguments, Rosenberg described the incident as a “bar fight” and said that Peña Reyes “wouldn’t come [Luckey] be nice or be friendly.”
“What Mr. Luckey did was fair and reasonable,” Rosenberg said. “What Mr. Luckey did was in response to an attack.”
Wilson said he wanted to hear from an expert on the appropriateness of Luckey’s deployment and security guard rules.
The Maryland State Police regulates security guards who are employed by private security companies. There is little training required for the approximately 12,500 security guards licensed by the state police. However, guards working for non-security employers are not regulated by the state unless they apply for a gun license. Federal labor statistics estimate that there are a total of 25,000 security guards in the state.
State police revoked Luckey’s handgun license and suspended his security guard license after he was charged with murder.
With no evidence to support the state’s theory on the case, Wilson said it was up to him to decide whether to believe Luckey or Peña Reyes.
“I just don’t think you’ve fulfilled your burden of proof,” he told the prosecutor.
Luckey is scheduled to appear January 3 for a preliminary hearing in the District Court of Homicide. He will likely be indicted by then and tried in Circuit Court where all jury trials take place.
Source:localtodaynews
