Brian Rose Pleads Guilty to January 2006 Murder Of Carjacking Victim
Baltimore, Maryland - Brian Keith Rose, age 24, of Baltimore, pleaded guilty today to the January 2006, attempted carjacking of Warren T. Fleming, resulting in Mr. Fleming’s death.
The guilty plea was announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein; Special Agent in Charge Theresa R. Stoop of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives - Baltimore Field Division; Chief James W. Johnson of the Baltimore County Police Department; and Baltimore County State’s Attorney Scott Shellenberger.
According to the statement of facts, on January 5, 2006, Rose was driving a stolen vehicle on Reisterstown Road in Baltimore City. Rose’s nephew, a juvenile, was a passenger in the car. Police attempted to stop the car, but Rose sped away and police were unable to follow. Rose drove the stolen car to the parking lot at Security Square Mall in Woodlawn and saw Warren T. Fleming walking towards his vehicle, a 2001 black Mercedes Benz, which was parked in the lot. Rose pulled up alongside the Mercedes and he and his nephew approached Fleming with the intention of taking Fleming’s car. During the encounter, Fleming was shot once in the head and died almost instantly. After the shooting, Rose and his nephew fled in the stolen vehicle, leaving Fleming’s body slumped out of the driver’s side door of the Mercedes, with the door open and the car running. Rose and his nephew abandoned the stolen car at the Owings Mills Metro Station, and took the Metro into Baltimore City. The stolen car was discovered later that evening with the engine still running and the ignition damaged so that the vehicle could be started without a key.
Rose’s fingerprints were recovered from the inside of the window of the driver’s side door of the Mercedes and from the stolen car. In addition, blood matching Mr. Fleming’s DNA was found on the outside passenger door of the stolen car. Rose was arrested on January 18, 2006. Rose’s nephew was killed in an unrelated matter on April 30, 2007.
Rose was initially charged in Baltimore County Circuit Court, but a Baltimore County judge ruled that the fingerprint evidence was inadmissible as the science of fingerprint analysis was unreliable. The United States Attorney’s Office then indicted Rose in U.S. District Court on April 1, 2008. In September 2009, U.S. District Judge Catherine C. Blake found that the fingerprint evidence was reliable and allowed its admission in this case, issuing a memorandum in December 2009, explaining the basis for her ruling.
Rose faces a maximum sentence of life in prison, although the government and the defendant have agreed that a sentence of 40 years in prison without the possibility of parole is appropriate in this case. Judge Blake has scheduled sentencing for January 19, 2010 at 3:00 p.m.
United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein commended Assistant United States Attorneys John F. Purcell, Charles J. Peters and James G. Warwick, who are prosecuting the case.