Steve Burns
WMAL.com
ROCKVILLE – (WMAL) The Three suspects charged with murdering two soon-to-be high school graduates in Montgomery Village have been held without bond by a Montgomery County District Court judge. Roger Garcia, 19, Edgar Garcia-Gaona, 24, and Jose Ovilson Canales-Yanez, 25 all were shown via closed-circuit television in the courtroom. They all face two counts each of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, all facing the rest of their lives behind bars.
Judge John Moffett called the crime “brutal,” noting it seemed deliberately planned and carried out with a sense of “overkill.”
The defendants stated they all plan on hiring private attorneys, and said little else to the judge. The state asserted the two brothers in the case were at an increased risk of leaving the area if they were let out, as they were arrested in a car with a packed suitcase. Garcia-Gaona began to dispute that notion, but he was cut off by the public defender, who urged him not to discuss details of the case.
All three are set to be back in court on July 14.
Outside the courthouse, the parents of one of the victims, Shadi Najjar, continued to insist their son was not involved with drugs as the police account stated.
“My boy doesn’t need nothing,” Adi Najjar told reporters. “My boy is a beautiful boy. We raised him right. We love him.”
Montgomery County Police said Shadi Najjar’s murder may have been revenge for an alleged drug robbery he committed in December 2016 or January 2017. Artem Ziberov’s killing, they said, may have been incidental. Both were set to walk in Northwest High School’s graduation the next day.
Copyright 2017 by WMAL.com. All Rights Reserved. (PHOTO: Steve Burns/WMAL)
