Co-Defendants with Combined 92 Charges Reject Pleas

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

A 19-year-old and a 20-year-old with 92 charges, combined, rejected plea offers and received trial dates during reception court on Sept. 28 at Baltimore City Circuit Court.

Stephawn Tate, 20, and James Servance Jr., 19, are both charged in connection with an incident on Nov. 9, 2020. The charges include four counts of attempted first and second-degree murder, four counts of first and second-degree assault, and additional firearm, robbery, and conspiracy-related charges.

Tate has 28 charges and Servance has 59 charges stemming from the incident.

Tate is also charged with the fatal shooting of a 27-year-old man on the 1600 block of West North Avenue on Nov. 13, 2020. His charges include first-degree murder and four firearm-related charges.

In all cases against him, the prosecution offered Tate life, suspending all but 60 years, and five years of probation for first-degree murder, and 20 years for conspiracy to commit robbery. The prosecution would also dismiss a third case against Tate involving narcotics.

Tate and his attorney, Todd Oppenheim, rejected the offer—the same offer that was rejected on Aug. 10.

A trial was set for March 1, 2022, for the murder case, and the prosecutor said there would be up to 25 witnesses. The attempted murder and narcotics cases are set to be tried together on March 15, 2022.

Tate’s co-defendant, James Servance, was offered a plea of five years without parole for firearm use in a felony violent crime, and 20 years, suspending all but five, for conspiracy to commit robbery.

Servance and his attorney, Roya Hanna, rejected this offer, which the attorney said she heard for the first time on Tuesday.

Hanna told Judge Melissa Phinn that the prosecutor had not contacted her since last month and had scheduled this hearing for a date that he knew he would be out of town. She also stated that the prosecution has no victim, physical evidence or witnesses regarding these charges, and the defendant is only identified through a grainy, poor-quality video.

The prosecutor, who was standing in for their colleague, did not know when the original prosecutor would be back in town.

Judge Phinn scheduled Servance to return to reception court on Oct. 12.

Notifications are not yet available for this specific case. Please check back later for updates. Thank you.