Prosecutors say alleged getaway driver helped friend plan Starts Right Here killings

After failing to secure a first-degree murder conviction against the teenager who fatally shot two fellow students at a Des Moines alternative school, will prosecutors be able to prove that the accused getaway driver is guilty of the same charge?

In opening statements Wednesday in the trial of Bravon Tukes, now 20, prosecutors asserted that he played a key role with shooter Preston Walls in planning the Jan. 23 slayings of 16-year-old Rashad Carr and 18-year-old Gionni Dameron at the Starts Right Here program in downtown Des Moines.

They said Tukes directed Walls to shoot school founder William Holmes, also known as Will Keeps.

Walls, now 19, was tried on first-degree murder charges but was convicted Sept. 14 of lesser charges: second-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter and assault.

Walls, who testified in his trial that he attacked Carr and Dameron because he believed they were planning to kill him, was acquitted of criminal gang participation and attempted murder in the shooting of Holmes, who was severely wounded.

In Tukes' trial Wednesday, Assistant Polk County Attorney Stephanie Cox told the jury the prosecution will show that Tukes helped Walls plan the shootings after Carr, an aspiring rapper, made a "dis" video maligning Tukes' younger brother 16-year-old Trevontay Jenkins. Jenkins had been shot to death in a confrontation with Des Moines police the day after Christmas.

"Bravon Tukes told Preston Walls, 'I promise we won't have the last cry,'" Cox told the Jury.

During Walls' trial, Des Moines police detective Jeffrey George testified that the enmity between the victims and Tukes and Walls stemmed from a gang rivalry that had resulted in dozens of shootings around the Des Moines metro. He said Walls and Tukes were affiliated with a group known as Strap or OTR, meaning Only The Real, and Dameron and Carr were part of the Only My Brothers, or OMB, gang.

But a juror in that trial who spoke anonymously with the Des Moines Register after the verdict said jurors had found George's testimony unconvincing, and they believed Walls was motivated by fear for his life.

Cox in her opening statement Wednesday made no direct reference to gangs. She did say, however, that Holmes ― who runs the alternative school on Southwest Fifth Avenue for a safe haven for at-risk youth and has said he grew up as a gang member in Chicago ― suspected something was up in the weeks before the shootings, and had confronted Walls on Jan. 4.

"Tukes then told Walls to 'Smoke Will too', and Walls agreed," Cox said.

On the day of the shootings, Tukes was in continual communication with Walls, Cox said. After Walls shot Dameron, Carr and Holmes, he called Tukes as he ran past Principal Park and across the Raccoon River pedestrian bridge to the parking lot of Mullets restaurant, where Tukes was waiting, she said.

There, Walls jumped in the back of Tukes’ vehicle, which had no license plates, and they headed southwest "away from downtown," she said. Police arrested them a short time later.

Defense says police investigation missed context

In his opening statement, Tukes’ attorney, Jamie Deremiah, acknowledged that Tukes, a Lincoln High School graduate, was close with Walls. Tukes had come to Des Moines at age 4 after his father died, and he and Walls bonded after the unexpected death of Walls' father, Deremiah told the jury.

“That friendship became a brotherhood at that point,” he said.

Tukes’ family moved to St. Louis, but returned to Des Moines in 2020, Deremiah said.

“In the meantime, Walls got himself in trouble,” he said.

Tukes and his family tried to help his friend, and Tukes was instrumental in persuading Holmes to admit him at Starts Right Here, Deremiah said.

"The motivation behind Preston going to school is sitting in this courtroom today," he said. "It's Bravon Tukes and his family. They want what's best for Preston."

But then, Deremiah said, Tukes suffered the double tragedy of losing Jenkins shortly after another brother, Brandon Tukes, 23, was killed in a Nov. 5 shooting in Glendale, Arizona.

As Deremiah talked about Bravon Tukes' brothers, Tukes, wearing a blue suit and tan turtleneck, sat at the defense table and cried.

“In the midst of all this pain and sorrow, this young man is doing what he can to get by,” Deremiah said.

He said Tukes and Walls exchange private messages saying some "weird stuff about killing cops" but there was no real plot to do so and they were "blowing off steam."

The police investigation ignored many things and left out a lot of context, Deremiah said, asserting, for instance, that there were two getaway cars, though he didn't explain the significance.

As in Walls' trial, the first testimony in Tukes' trial came from the four Des Moines police officers who were the first to arrive at the shooting scene.

The jury saw video from the body cam of Officer Brian Cuppy showing the bloody bodies of Carr and Dameron and the wounded Holmes. Several distraught students could be heard screaming in anguish.

Walls' attorneys during his trial said Carr and Dameron had bullied Walls and that Walls knew on the day of the shootings that Dameron was carrying a concealed gun that Cuppy later found on the slain teen.

Cross-examined by Tukes' attorneys, Cuppy and other officers said they did not know how that indicated Tukes' alleged involvement.

"I don't know what it has to do with him," Cuppy told Deremiah.

Two more Des Moines police officers testified that they saw a Chevrolet Impala with no license plates drive by Starts Right Here a few minutes after the shooting. But Officer Adam Lemek could not tell Tukes attorneys whether the car was Tukes'.

"I can't say that for sure," Lemek said.

This article has been edited to correct who William Holmes confonted when he suspected tension between Preston Walls and other students at Starts Right Here.

Philip Joens covers public safety, retail, real estate and RAGBRAI for the Des Moines Register. He can be reached at 515-284-8184, pjoens@registermedia.com or on Twitter @Philip_Joens.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Prosecutors: Friend of shooter helped plan Starts Right Here shooting