19 March 16th–March 22nd, 2023 phoenixnewtimes.com phoenix new Times | cONTeNTs | feeDBacK | OPiNiON | NeWs | feaTuRe | NighT+Day | culTuRe | film | cafe | music | aggravating circumstances against Busani, 16 against Triplett, and 10 against Reed, including calling the 14-year-old a “danger to society.” Aggravating circumstances, such as involving an accomplice, damaging property, or having prior convictions, also lead to harsher criminal penalties and longer prison sentences under Arizona law. At one point, another prosecutor on the case, Mitch Rand, stated that Busani was facing 75 years in prison if convicted. But Rand also argued that should the case go to trial, the jury should not be allowed to know the possible sentences Busani, Reed, and Triplett faced, because that could make jurors less willing to convict them. Rand did not respond when contacted for this story. In October 2019, while Triplett was in jail awaiting trial, his 2-year-old son wandered into a pond near his mother’s apartment complex and drowned. After learning that his child had died, the jail placed Triplett on suicide watch. While incarcerated, Triplett also missed the birth of his second child. “I cry at night just thinking about it all,” Triplett said. “I am away from my family, my daughter like I never got to hold her. I didn’t get the chance to see her be born.” Then, in December 2019, prosecutors brought a separate 128-count indictment against the trio for their alleged involve- ment in a string of robberies that took place from November 2018 through January 2019. Prosecutors charged Busani with conspiracy to commit robbery, illegal control of an enterprise, and theft. They hit Reed with the same charges, plus eight counts of armed robbery, 22 counts of kidnapping, and 16 counts of aggravated assault. Prosecutors alleged that each person who was inside the establishments when the robberies occurred was kidnapped. The “aggravated assault” charges stem from Reed or Triplett “using a simulated handgun, a simulated deadly weapon” to place store employees “in reasonable apprehension of imminent physical injury.” Busani, Reed, and Triplett were not accused of actually physically harming people, though victims did tell the court they feared for their lives and suffered from anxiety and panic attacks after being held at gunpoint. Triplett was charged with conspiracy to commit armed robbery, theft, and eight counts of illegal control of an enterprise, 37 counts of armed robbery, 37 counts of kidnapping, and 40 counts of aggravated assault. In a statement shared with The Appeal, a spokesperson for the county attorney’s office said prosecutors had “carefully considered the mitigating and aggravating factors for each defendant’s plea agree- ment” and “acted with integrity to seek justice for the more than 50 individuals and 25 business victims in these matters.” In his testimony to a grand jury regarding the robbery case, Rasmussen explained that he had reviewed reports of armed robberies at fast food restaurants and convenience stores for similarities. Eventually he found several cases that involved people of color with similar builds wearing hoodies cinched up around their faces using a gun to take money from Circle Ks and Whataburgers. On January 11, hours after police killed Jacob Harris, officers served search warrants on the homes of Harris, Reed, and Triplett, where they said they found clothing, shoes, and accessories that matched what suspects in the other robberies were seen wearing on surveil- lance footage. Theresa Greene, Triplett’s mother; Shawanna Chambers, Reed’s aunt; and Roland Harris all say that the searches were conducted while the families were not home, and before police had informed them of the shooting and the arrests of their children. When Roland Harris walked out of his apartment that morning to drop his daughter off at school, he said he saw police cars blocking in his son’s Mazda. Though his son had already been dead for several hours, police did not say anything to Harris at that time. Instead, while Harris went to work, police raided his home, where he lived with Jacob. They took his son’s shoes, his clothes, his IDs, and his jewelry. They also took Roland Harris’s laptop, two watches, and $800 in cash. And they took Roland’s daughter’s iPads and a shoebox with her name on it that she stored money in. Only after that did police go to Roland Harris’s workplace to tell him his son was dead. Harris said Rasmussen first Officers Kristopher Bertz (left) and David Norman (right) in images from the Phoenix Police Department’s internal investigation of Bertz regarding the shooting of Jacob Harris. Jacob from p 17 >> p 20 Phoenix Police Department
