Loch Raven Boulevard Murder Defendant to Face Trial in December

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A 23-year-old murder defendant received a trial date after her attorney rejected the prosecution’s plea deal in Baltimore City Circuit Court Sept. 6.

Niyiraha Berry is charged with first-degree murder, firearm use in a felony violent crime and having a handgun on her person for the murder of 29-year-old Denzel Brown this spring.

The prosecution offered Berry a plea deal of life, suspending all but 40 years, for first-degree murder to run consecutively to 20 years, suspending all but five years without the possibility of parole, for firearm use in a felony violent crime. The plea also required Berry register as a gun offender and serve five years of probation. Defense attorney Robert Cole rejected the offer on Berry’s behalf.

Judge Melissa M. Phinn scheduled Berry’s five-day trial to begin on Dec. 11 before herself.

According to a Baltimore Police Department press release, a SWAT team responded to the 4000 block of Loch Raven Boulevard after Brown’s murder there on March 6, but authorities did not arrest Berry until later that month.