Mother shot dead in row with teenage brothers over Christmas presents in Florida

Evening Standard

Transcript

00:00 Averill Baldwin, her 10 month old son, her six year old son,

00:07 her 14 year old brother, Demarcus, her 15 year old brother,

00:13 Darcus, and their mother, Joyce Birch, who's a black female with

00:19 a date of birth of June 25th, 1984, went Christmas shopping at a store here in Argo.

00:26 While they're shopping, 15 year old Darcus was jealous that their mother,

00:31 Joyce, was getting 14 year old Demarcus more gifts than he was receiving.

00:36 So they had this family spat about who was getting what and

00:39 what money was being spent on who.

00:41 And they're having this big thing going on in the store and

00:44 they're all arguing with each other.

00:46 They left the store and headed to their grandmother's house,

00:52 which is where the incident happened at 2357 22nd Avenue Southwest in Argo.

00:59 They all piled into one car and they were heading over to her house.

01:03 The Coley's, along with Joyce Birch,

01:06 lived at 608 Westminster Boulevard in Oldsmar.

01:11 They were going to their grandmother's house because she was gonna watch

01:15 Bree's six year old and 11 month old baby when she went to work.

01:22 So they got there to this house on 22nd Avenue Southwest at about 145 PM on Sunday.

01:29 Darcus, who's the 15 year old,

01:32 entered the home and went into the kitchen with his grandmother.

01:37 Demarcus, the 14 year old, stood in the doorway because again, they're all arguing.

01:44 And they're having this big spat about what happened while shopping and

01:47 who's getting what and who didn't get what for Christmas.

01:50 So this is just normal what people do when they have these young kids getting

01:53 spats like this.

01:54 And of course, I'm saying this sarcastically because he's all mad at his

01:57 brother about what his brother was getting and is not getting.

01:59 He stood in the doorway and he took out his 40 caliber semi-automatic handgun.

02:04 And he pointed it at Darcus and told him he was going to shoot him in the head.

02:08 So you got the 14 year old who's mad at the 15 year old because mom's not buying

02:16 equal amounts of gifts to get to grandma's house and he takes out his gun.

02:22 And tells him he's gonna shoot him in the head.

02:26 So Demarcus tries to get Darcus to fight.

02:29 Darcus said he didn't wanna fight and told him to get out of the house and

02:33 he didn't want anything to do with him.

02:34 Now, one of the boy's uncles was present in the home and

02:39 excuse me, he separated them by moving Demarcus out of the house and

02:45 moving him out into the driveway area.

02:47 This is the house here to my right, again to your left, and

02:50 that's the door where he was standing into and

02:53 that's the driveway area that he moved him out to where this happened.

02:57 And so Demarcus left the doorway,

03:01 Darcus is still in the house in the kitchen.

03:03 Demarcus was standing by a parked vehicle in the driveway when

03:08 Abriel told Demarcus, quote, you all need to leave that stuff alone.

03:12 Why are you trying to start it?

03:14 It's Christmas.

03:15 And at that point, Abriel was in the driveway and

03:17 she was carrying her ten month old baby in a carrier in her hand.

03:21 Demarcus then began arguing with Abriel and used some very,

03:26 very derogatory language that I won't repeat at all and all kinds of profanity.

03:31 He was calling her a whore and all kinds of other stuff and

03:35 stated that he was going to shoot her and that he was gonna, quote, shoot the baby too.

03:41 Demarcus then moved toward Abriel and shot her in the chest with a 40 caliber

03:46 semi-automatic handgun, again, while she's carrying the baby.

03:49 Abriel fell to the ground, so did the baby.

03:52 The baby wasn't hurt because the baby was in a carrier.

03:54 So when Demarcus falls to the ground, Darcus comes out of the house.

04:01 And again, Darcus is 15, and he takes out his 45 caliber semi-automatic handgun,

04:08 because again, I'll say this sarcastically, just normal that all these kids,

04:11 that's what you do, right?

04:12 You just carry handguns.

04:13 When you get in a spat with your sibling, you take out your guns,

04:15 you have a gun battle.

04:16 So he takes out his gun and tells Demarcus, so

04:21 Darcus tells Demarcus, quote, you shot my MF sister.

04:26 And then Darcus shot Demarcus one time in the stomach.

04:30 So Demarcus falls to the ground.

04:34 And when Darcus shot Demarcus, Demarcus was unarmed.

04:39 And there's about an eight second gap between the time that Demarcus shot Brie,

04:45 and then Darcus comes out and shoots Demarcus.

04:48 And when he shot him, he no longer had possession of the gun.

04:52 Darcus, the 15 year old, then ran,

05:00 threw his gun in a nearby yard, fled to a relative's house up in Clearwater,

05:05 where we subsequently arrested him.

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