A murder charge in the case against Kevon Marquis Austin has been dropped by prosecutors, allowing for Austin’s release and closing the case against him.
Austin was suspected in the Oct. 2012 shooting death of Gregory Darnell Troxler.
Troxler was found shot on Oct. 10 just before 4 p.m. in the 1100 block of 8th Street Northeast. Austin was arrested Oct. 20, ten days after the homicide.
On Feb. 7, the day before Austin was due to appear for a preliminary hearing in the case, prosecutors asked Judge Ronna Beck to dismiss the charge and release Austin.
Austin, 19, was arrested during a traffic stop and had been in custody since his arrest.
At Austin’s presentment at DC Superior Court, Judge Karen Howze found that there was probable cause in the case against Austin and ordered him held without bail.
At the time of Troxler’s death, Austin was enrolled in the court’s Electronic Monitoring Program in an unrelated case. Prosecutors said Austin’s GPS bracelet stopped emitting a GPS signal less than an hour before Troxler’s death and that officers believed Austin had tampered with the device by placing aluminum foil around it to block the GPS signal. The GPS device vibrates every 10 seconds when the signal is disrupted, so Austin should have known to correct it, documents state.
According to charging documents, one witness identified Austin as the suspect from photographs. Another said he saw someone wearing a brown hooded sweatshirt who looked like Austin near the crime scene. A third witness reported seeing the man in the sweatshirt shoot another person in the alley where Troxler was later found.
Police have not named any other suspects in the case.
Judge Beck signed a jail release order for Austin on Feb. 7.
