Loomis guard accidentally killed by co-worker during robbery attempt
New Orleans LA October 24 2018 A Loomis armored truck guard slain outside a Mid-City bank last year was inadvertently shot to death by a co-worker who fired his pistol while desperately trying to fend off an armed robbery attempt, a federal prosecutor said Monday.
A New Orleans federal court jury watched video footage — and heard a detailed account — of 33-year-old guard Jimmy McBride’s slaying during opening arguments at the trial of the father and son charged with his murder.
However, the attorneys for Jerome Kieffer, 25, and Armstead Kieffer, 54, argued their innocence to the 10-woman, two-man jury.
According to the defense, moments before the botched robbery, the elder Kieffer persuaded his son to back out of the stick-up, which they said was masterminded by Deltoine Scott. Scott then went ahead with it with the aid of another unidentified person, the defense said.
After his arrest, defense attorneys added, Scott protected that accomplice by implicating Jerome Kieffer — a former high school basketball teammate — and his dad.
After attending McNeese State University on a football scholarship, Deltoine Scott was unhappy with his life’s outlook when a friend called hi…
Scott, 25, pleaded guilty earlier this month to roles in the robbery that led to McBride’s killing on May 31, 2017, as well as in a 2015 armored truck holdup that the feds said netted him and accomplices $100,000.
In return for a chance to eventually be released from prison, Scott is slated to testify against the Kieffers, who he claims spearheaded both crimes.
Even though both sides agree that none of the robbers actually shot McBride, the Kieffers still face life imprisonment if convicted of setting off a chain of events that ended in his death.
The trial is expected to last through the week in U.S. District Judge Ivan Lemelle’s courtroom.
In his opening statement, Assistant U.S. Attorney David Haller described a mountain of evidence — including cellphone records, financial documents and video surveillance — that he said supports Scott’s story.
Scott claims that he and Jerome Kieffer ambushed a Brinks truck outside a 7th Ward bank on Oct. 11, 2015, stealing six figures’ worth of cash and using a sport-utility vehicle belonging to Scott’s grandfather as a getaway car. He says their pistols that day were given to them by Armstead Kieffer.
Investigators later found Jerome Kieffer’s DNA on a Saints hat left behind at the scene of the robbery, Haller said. But that wouldn’t occur until after the group later targeted the Loomis truck outside Campus Federal Credit Union, adjacent to Jerome Kieffer’s apartment in the 2200 block of Tulane Avenue, Haller argued.
According to Haller, Armstead Kieffer was in a red Nissan Sentra parked across the street from Campus Federal and, with his cellphone, gave his son and Scott the signal to spring the ambush as the Loomis guards restocked the credit union’s ATMs.
Yet before the robbers could get any money, one of McBride’s two co-workers exchanged gunfire with both Scott and Jerome Kieffer, Haller said. One shot from the Loomis guard struck McBride, fatally wounding him as he lay next to the driver’s door of the truck.
The key break in the case came hours later, when New Orleans police pulled over Scott’s grandfather as he drove the robbers’ distinctive black-and-white getaway truck, which had been spotted on bank surveillance.
The grandfather told police he had let Scott borrow the truck for most of that day. That led the feds — who prosecute bank-related robberies — to focus on and eventually charge Scott and the Kieffers.
“By the end of the case, we will have proven these men are guilty beyond any doubt — much less any reasonable doubt,” Haller said.
The Kieffers are represented by separate court-appointed legal teams. Attorneys Gregory Carter, John Fuller and Kevin Kelly represent Armstead Kieffer. Nicole Burdett and Jason Williams, the New Orleans city councilman, represent Jerome Kieffer.
However, Carter’s and Burdett’s opening statements propped each other up.
Burdett said Scott pulled off the 2015 robbery with another person who wasn’t Jerome Kieffer. She didn’t offer a name but suggested her client’s Saints hat was found at the 2015 scene because Scott may have taken it beforehand.
Then, when he realized his friend had moved into an apartment overlooking Campus Federal’s ATMs, Scott planned another job, she said. In addition to his accomplice from the first robbery, he recruited Kieffer, who looped his dad in on the plan, Burdett said.
Armstead Kieffer balked at what his son was considering doing and urged him to abandon the plan, Burdett said. Shortly before McBride’s killing, she said, Armstead Kieffer was on the phone with Jerome, begging him to get into his car parked across the street so they could leave together.
Jerome Kieffer finally listened moments ahead of the deadly shootout, running to his father’s car and driving away with him, Burdett argued.
Meanwhile, Scott forged on with the ill-fated ambush and eventually directed the feds to the Kieffers to protect his actual accomplice, said Burdett, portraying Scott as a liar and experienced robber.
Carter endorsed Burdett’s portrayal of his client, saying, “Armstead Kieffer is on trial for behaving the same way any father would behave if … he’s trying to talk his son out of making the biggest mistake of his life.”
The Advocate
