Second Trial in Execution-Style Shooting of 15-Year-Old Set to Begin

The trial of a 22-year-old man charged with kidnapping and shooting a 15-year-old boy in Marriottsville is scheduled to begin on Wednesday.

Donald George Peoples, of Nottingham, is the second person to be tried in the case in which the 15-year-old was shot in the back of the head and left for dead in a field in June of 2012. The victim survived.

Chiquita Sketers, 22, of Randallstown, was sentenced to 25 years in prison after pleading guilty to attempted murder earlier this year.

Police say Peoples and another woman, Laura Christian Karr, also charged, abducted the boy from near his Reisterstown home, then picked up Sketers, who brought a long barrel rifle.

According to testimony in Sketers' trial, the three mistook the 15-year-old as someone who had stolen $200 from them, according to Wayne Kirwan, a spokesperson for the State’s Attorney’s office.

The victim stated that while in the car, Sketers “told him that he was going to die while loading the rifle with ammunition,” according to court documents.

Karr, Peoples and Sketers drove the boy to a field in Marriottsvile and forced him out of the car at gunpoint, say police. That’s when Peoples shot him in the back of the head, according to police.

A resident found the boy near the 11400 block of Old Frederick Road with a gunshot wound. He was transported to the University of Maryland Shock Trauma Center in critical condition, but was later released.

Peoples faces charges of attempted first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, kidnapping, first-degree assault, use of a firearm in a felony crime and armed robbery. 

Karr’s trial is scheduled to begin on Dec. 2, according to online court records. Karr was arrested in August of 2012 after a dramatic scene at her residence in which police shot and killed a man who swung a sword at an officer as they entered.

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