Prosecutor Will Bring Mother as Witness in Retrial of Brother’s Homicide Case

By Shiloh Eschbach [former] - October 27, 2023
Court | Daily Stories | Homicides | Shooting | Suspects | Victims |

On Oct. 23, in Baltimore City Circuit Court, in an emotional opening statement, the prosecutor of a homicide defendant claimed with intensity that the lives of the defendant’s family were shattered when he allegedly shot and killed his brother in the family basement. 

Singleton Duppins, 22, is charged with first-degree murder, two counts of second-degree assault, firearm use in a felony violent crime and possession of a firearm as a minor in connection to the fatal shooting of 26-year-old Graham Blake.

The prosecution argued how Duppins shot Blake in the family home on the 2500 block of Gibbons Avenue on Feb. 28, 2020. The prosecution theorized that Duppins shot Blake after Blake confronted him about a missing pistol which Blake used in his job as a security guard.

Duppins was tried on June 6 and found not guilty of all but the charge of possession of a firearm as a minor, but he is being retried on the major counts.

Additionally, the prosecution planned to provide evidence that Duppins’ statement to Baltimore Police Department (BPD) officers was self-incriminating. When officers asked him about a wound on his finger, he allegedly told them that it was bleeding because his brother bit him.

The prosecution shared their plans to call Blake and Duppins’ Mother to the stand where they expect her to tell the jury that she found Singleton on top of Blake right after she heard a gunshot.

Defense attorney Roland Brown, who represented Duppins in court, disagreed with the prosecution, saying that he did not expect to hear the mother of Blake and Duppins say that she saw the defendant anywhere near the victim.

Judge Althea M. Handy presided over the opening statements of Blake’s trial on Monday.

According to documents from the District Court of Maryland, BPD officers responding to this incident found Blake face down with a gunshot wound on the back of his head and saw Duppins, who was 19 at the time, flee the scene, though his parents attempted to restrain him. He was later located on the 5000 block of Harford Road with the help of his mother.