A 12-year-old boy from Milwaukee could go to jail for the rest of his life after being accused of killing an adult to steal his gun. Police say the defendant hatched the scheme after the victim, 34-year-old Brandon Felton, refused to sell him his weapons, including an AR-15 rifle.
The defendant, whose name has not been released due to his age, was linked to the case after police found a pizza receipt from the night of the murder that had been ordered using the boy’s mobile phone, according to a criminal complaint. . Investigators say the boy made a series of incoherent statements to police before acknowledging that he was there at the time of the murder, but said he was only there to play video games and blamed someone else for the slaying.
However, police said texts obtained from the boy’s phone through a search warrant showed that he was making plans with two other people to steal the guns. The court document claimed that on the day of the murder, a text from the defendant’s phone read, “I’m going to do it to Brandan [sic].” The text conversation shows that the defendant later said that he had a gun and asked: “should I kill him [right now]?” The person on the other end of the conversation said, “Noooo,” but the defendant allegedly responded, “I’m going to hit him, I don’t have time for a guy to go after my family.”
Police say the defendant later confessed to his mother that he had lied to police and that he intended to take Felton’s guns because he did not want to sell them.
