Jury Reports Difficulty Reaching Verdict in Reisterstown Teen's Murder Trial
A Baltimore County jury weighing murder and robbery charges against a 20-year-old Reisterstown man told a judge Monday that it was unable to reach a unanimous verdict in the 2024 shooting death of 17-year-old Nestor Nunez.
Mehki Brown, 20, of Reisterstown, was charged in April 2025 with murder, armed robbery and firearm offenses, approximately 10 months after Nunez's death.
Jurors heard four days of testimony before beginning deliberations Friday evening. They broke for the weekend after about five hours and resumed deliberations Monday morning.
At 11:30 a.m., the jury sent a note to Baltimore County Circuit Judge Jan Alexander saying it could not reach a unanimous verdict. Robinson instructed jurors to continue deliberating. Minutes later, they sent another note seeking clarification about the application of the standard of proof beyond a reasonable doubt. The judge reviewed the standard and again sent the jurors back to the deliberation room.
Nunez was found dead of multiple gunshot wounds about 6:30 a.m. June 9, 2024, in a parking lot in the 200 block of Hammershire Road in Reisterstown. Investigators believe he was shot around 12:50 a.m.
Key evidence at Brown's trial included photographs showing him wearing a sweatshirt and shoes resembling those Nunez had owned and holding a handgun similar to one Nunez had displayed on social media. Both guns had distinctive red backplates.
A cellphone belonging to Nunez was recovered from Brown the day after the killing.
Assistant State's Attorney Natalie Scurto argued that the evidence amounted to more than a series of coincidences.
“He would have to be literally the unluckiest person on the planet for all of these things to match up,” Scurto told jurors.
But defense attorney Latoya Francis-Williams argued that prosecutors had failed to establish that Brown participated in the killing. She pointed to the absence of an apparent motive and DNA evidence connecting Brown to Nunez. She said the location evidence and the fact that Brown was excluded as a DNA contributor to items found on Nunez prove his innocence.
Francis-Williams accused investigators of having “tunnel vision” and ignoring evidence that pointed away from her client.
“The actual objective documented scientific evidence says this young man had nothing to do with a robbery or a killing,” she said.
Photos, a Gun and a Missing Phone
On June 10, 2024, a school resource officer at Franklin High School in Reisterstown found a loaded gun in Brown's backpack and seized an iPhone from his pocket. Investigators later determined that the phone belonged to Nunez.
Brown was charged with assault, resisting arrest, having a weapon on school property, disturbing school and possessing a firearm without a serial number. Those charges remain pending, and a trial date for those charges was postponed Monday.
When Brown was arrested at school, police had not identified him as a suspect in Nunez's killing.
In a recorded jail call, Brown said he had found the phone on the ground while walking to school.
Investigators also obtained photographs showing Brown wearing a yellow “Free the Hood” sweatshirt identical to one Nunez owned. He was wearing black-and-white Under Armour shoes that prosecutors said matched those Nunez had worn shortly before his death.
Nunez was wearing only socks when his body was discovered.
In photographs taken Sunday evening, June 9, Brown pointed a handgun with a red backplate resembling a Glock that Nunez had displayed in social media photographs.
Prosecutors alleged that Brown or others involved in the killing took the clothing and gun from Nunez.
Scurto said surveillance video from June 8 showed multiple people running to a car around 9:40 p.m. Investigators believe the vehicle had been tracking Nunez's movements.
The yellow sweatshirt with red writing was taken from Brown when he was booked into jail following the school incident. It was not considered evidence at the time and subsequently went missing.
Brown testified that the sweatshirt belonged to him and was not Nunez's. Francis-Williams also maintained that the shoes were her client's and questioned why investigators had not tested them for Nunez's DNA.
Scurto countered that investigators found no photographs of Brown wearing the sweatshirt or shoes before Nunez's death. The defense pointed to an earlier photograph showing Brown wearing a yellow hood, although the rest of the sweatshirt was not visible.
Disputed Location Evidence
Francis-Williams argued that GPS location data from Brown's iPad placed him in Owings Mills between 12:58 and 1:52 a.m. June 9. Police believe the shooting occurred around 12:50 a.m.
Scurto said the distance between the two locations was approximately 1.9 miles, typically a five- or six-minute drive.
She pointed to testimony that a witness heard a car speeding away after the shots were fired and suggested that Brown and others involved could have fled the scene quickly enough to account for the location data.
Messages Before and After the Killing
Prosecutors introduced Instagram messages Brown sent in May discussing obtaining a “bip,” slang for a gun, cheaply or for free. Days before the killing, he referred to committing a “lick,” slang for a robbery.
Investigators determined that the gun recovered from Brown's backpack at school was not one of the two firearms used to kill Nunez.
Brown took the witness stand Friday and testified that he and Nunez had attended school together and had a “cordial” relationship.
He said he was at the Morningside Apartments in Owings Mills, using his iPad, at the time the shooting occurred. He also said he was at a laundromat around 2 a.m.
Brown said the yellow “Free the Hood” sweatshirt and Under Armour shoes in the photographs belonged to him, not Nunez. He said he previously had taken photographs of himself wearing the sweatshirt, which had red lettering, but could not produce them because his photos were lost when his phone had broken.
He denied robbing or shooting Nunez.
Brown said he learned of Nunez's death through a post on the Instagram account “Murder Ink.”
Asked by his attorney about the photographs showing him holding a gun, Brown said he had asked a girl to take his picture “just to be cool, impress the female, being young.”
Brown could not identify by name the person he said he was with that night.
Prosecutors also highlighted messages Brown sent to a girl not long after the shooting, asking her to call him because he needed to discuss something he could not put in writing.
“I can't say sh** over text,” he wrote.
“The reason he doesn't want to say anything over text is because he doesn't want to leave evidence that, yes, he did get into some real sh**,” Scurto argued.
In another message, Brown told the girl, “I needed you last night.”
The defense offered a different explanation, saying Brown simply wanted to connect with the girl for “loving.”
Brown was charged with felony murder, and the prosecution argued that while he may not have been the shooter, he was one of a group of people who carried out the crime. Scurto argued that Brown and others engaged in “criminal teamwork,” making him responsible for the killing even if someone else fired the fatal shots.
Investigators believe three or four people occupied a vehicle that followed Nunez after he finished work at a Noodles & Company restaurant about 11:45 p.m. June 8.
No one else has been charged in connection with the case besides Brown.
The vehicle allegedly followed Nunez as he walked to a Taco Bell, remained there for about an hour and then boarded an MTA bus.
At 12:59 a.m. June 9, a neighbor called 911 and reported hearing gunshots approximately five to 10 minutes earlier.
Nunez's body was discovered roughly five hours later beside a parked vehicle. He had been shot six times, and investigators determined that two different firearms had been used.
Defense Challenges Investigation
Francis-Williams argued that prosecutors had failed to establish a direct connection between Brown and the shooting.
She emphasized that investigators found no DNA evidence linking Brown to Nunez, which she said excluded her client as a suspect. She also said police found no digital communications establishing any conflict between the two.
She also questioned why prosecutors had not called the people Brown messaged the night of the killing or the following morning to testify about those conversations.