Trial Begins for Defendant Who Allegedly Shot ‘Knife-Wielding Maniac’

Thank you for reading Baltimore Witness. Help us continue our mission into 2024.

Baltimore City Circuit Court jurors listened to opening statements in the case of a 22-year-old Poppleton resident who, according to the defense, saved two women by killing a high “knife-wielding maniac” inside a southwest Baltimore residence last winter.

Jerrod Smith is charged with second-degree murder and firearm use in a felony violent crime for the death of 31-year-old Toby Rogers inside a friend’s apartment on the 4300 block of Seminole Avenue.

The prosecution admitted Rogers indeed had a knife and had used the drug MDMA on Dec. 30, 2023, when he drove from Hagerstown to give a television to his friend who lived in the Seminole Avenue apartment. According to the prosecutor, Smith and his girlfriend, the apartment resident’s cousin, were also there and the group spent the day hanging out and drinking as a group.

At one time, the prosecutor explained, Rogers left the apartment and when he returned, he was irritated and pulled out a knife. While the apartment resident was trying to get Rogers to calm down, Smith allegedly shot Rogers in the chest with a rifle. Rogers was shot two more times, including once at “very, very close range” in the head, the prosecutor said.

Defense attorney Andrew Saller told jurors that when Rogers returned to the apartment after leaving earlier in the day, “No one had ever seen him that high before.”

The victim was extremely agitated and screaming at his host. “[Rogers was] out of control,” Saller said.

Had Smith not shot Rogers, Saller claimed the jury would be in court for the deaths of the two women in the apartment.

Testimony began Sept. 25 before Judge Robert K. Taylor, Jr.