In Chief Judge Lee Satterfield’s courtroom Wednesday, what wasn’t in the testimony was just as significant for Wanda Ortiz as what was.
“I want to know something,” Ortiz said. “What’s going on with her?”
“Her” is a DC police officer, now removed from duties, who authorities believe was present when Ortiz’ son, Wyatt Earp Robinson, was gunned down outside a seafood shop on Minnesota Avenue NE in August.
According to charging documents in the case, investigators believe that as Robinson was walking down the street, he “looked in the direction” of three people sitting on a Clay Place porch. One of those men chased after Robinson, pushed him with a gun, then fired at him multiple times.
That man, whom police identified as Ricardo Mitchell, was in court Wednesday for a preliminary hearing. Satterfield found substantial probability that Mitchell committed the offense, charged as first-degree murder, and ordered him held pending an indictment.
But it was the DC cop, Mitchell’s girlfriend, who Ortiz wanted to see in court.
“She had every opportunity to stop him,” Ortiz said. “The fact that she didn’t is the most heartbreaking thing ever.”
Police Chief Cathy Lanier said last month that if the officer was present and failed to take action, then she would face criminal charges.
Though listed as “witness two” in charging documents and used to build the government’s case against Mitchell, the girlfriend was not a part of testimony at the preliminary hearing. Prosecutor Steve Gripkey did not ask that those documents be admitted to the record and did not ask Detective Hosam Nasr any questions about witness two.
Because witness two was not discussed on direct examination, defense attorney Lauren Bernstein was not permitted to ask any questions about the witness, either.
Ortiz said she just wants to see the girlfriend in court.
“Is she above the law? Anyone else they would have brought into that courtroom. I don’t want her to be held above the law,” Ortiz said.
Update: Fox5 was also in the court room today. Here’s Paul Wagner’s report on the hearing:
