OAKLAND (BCN)– A judge Monday ordered an ex-felon to stand trial on murder and attempted murder charges for a shooting during an alleged home invasion robbery at a 17-year-old’s birthday party in East Oakland that left two people dead in August 2013.
Dachaun Dupree, 24, had been charged with two counts of murder for the shooting outside of a home on 105th Avenue at about 11 p.m. on Aug. 16, 2013, but prosecutor Neil Layton only sought to have him stand trial for the death of one of the two victims in the case because of a lack of evidence directly tying Dupree to the other victim’s death.
At the end of a preliminary hearing that spanned parts of more than 10 days over the past two months, Alameda County Superior Court Judge Stuart Hing also ordered Dupree, an Oakland man with a prior conviction for pimping, to stand trial on an account of attempted robbery and the special circumstance of committing a murder during the course of a robbery.
In addition, Hing ordered Dupree to stand trial on three charges for allegedly selling drugs outside of his home in East Oakland on Dec. 11, 2013. Dupree was arrested on the drug charges at that time and six days later was charged with murder for the Aug. 16 shooting.
According to police and prosecutors, Dupree, 19-year-old Bryan Gonzalez and a third man who was never identified and arrested heard about the 17-year-old’s birthday party and planned to go there to rob people because many people would be present.
Describing the incident as “a robbery that went bad,” Layton said Dupree, Gonzalez and the third suspect started shooting at the partygoers but one of the partygoers, Juan Sedano, fired back and killed Gonzalez.
Sedano wasn’t charged because he fired in self-defense.
Layton said he believes the evidence in the case shows that one of the shots fired by Dupree killed another guest at the party, 38-year-old Pablo Armenta-Burgos of Oakland, and another shot wounded a third person.
Dupree was charged with a second count of murder for Gonzalez’s death under the provocative act doctrine, which holds a suspect responsible for an accomplice’s death if it occurs during a dangerous felony such as a shooting, even if the suspect didn’t kill the accomplice.
However, Layton said there wasn’t enough evidence at the preliminary hearing to ask for Dupree to stand trial on a charge for Gonzalez’s death.
Dupree’s lawyer, Charles Denton, argued today that Dupree shouldn’t be ordered to stand trial for Armenta-Burgos’ death, saying there’s no reliable evidence he was even at the scene of the shooting and that he fired shots.
Denton said the evidence in the case is so unclear that it’s possible that Armenta-Burgos was killed by one of the shots fired by Gonzalez or a shot fired by Sedano.
Denton said it would be wrong to order Dupree to stand trial for Armenta-Burgos’ death based on what he described as “speculation and conjecture.”
Dupree is scheduled to return to court on June 8 to have a trial date set.