Wilmington, DE: Delaware courts: Prosecutor says mentor killed over woman

Trial begins in shooting of community leader Hoey

By SEAN O'SULLIVAN
The News Journal

WILMINGTON -- In opening statements this week, prosecutors charged that D'Andre Rogers shot and killed community mentor Derrick "Rick" Hoey on Jan. 4, 2009, to end a fight that didn't involve him.

Deputy Attorney General Cynthia L. Faraone told a Superior Court jury that Rogers, 25, went with a friend to a home in the 200 block of West 35th Street around 5 a.m. that day. The friend wanted to check up on a girlfriend -- or ex-girlfriend -- and got upset when Hoey, who was dating the woman, came to the door.

Hoey and the man then began a lengthy argument that moved outside, then back inside and then was set to be "settled" in the kitchen.

At that point, Faraone said, Rogers, who had been outside listening, ran into the home and into the kitchen. Witnesses reported hearing shots, Faraone said, and one said she saw Rogers with the gun in his hand.

Rogers and the other man fled, according to prosecutors, and after people at the home emerged from cover, they found 41-year-old Hoey on the front steps, bleeding. Thirty minutes later, Faraone said, he died.

Faraone said Rogers fled the state. He was arrested in North Carolina in May 2009. Faraone told the jury he confessed in North Carolina when police interviewed him.

Defense attorney Ralph D. Wilkinson IV, in his opening, raised questions about who fired the gun and the motivation of the shooter, arguing that if the intent was not to kill, then a first-degree murder charge could not be sustained.

If convicted, Rogers faces up to life in prison. The trial is expected to last at least a week.