The Philadelphia District Attorney's office filed a motion Wednesday in support of trying as an adult the teenager who is a suspect in the killing of a community activist last September.
Marvin Roberts, who was 16 at the time of the slaying of Gerard Grandzol Sept. 7, has requested through his defense attorney to be tried in juvenile court.
Grandzol's killing, which police say occurred during an attempted carjacking, has gained considerable attention, in part because of Grandzol's well-known community activism. Investigators also described the shooting as particularly heinous: The 38-year-old man was shot twice in the face as his two-year-old daughter sat in the back seat of his car.
District Attorney Larry Krasner's office filed a response Wednesday opposing Roberts' attorney's request for a trial in juvenile court.
"The defendant committed a brutal, premeditated murder without provocation. The defendant's actions both during and after the killing warrant prosecution as an adult," the DA's office wrote in the brief. "The limits of the juvenile justice system are wholly insufficient to adequately address the seriousness of this senseless killing."
Grandzol's family has pressed Krasner to push for a trial on adult charges for Roberts.
Marvin Roberts, now 17, and his brother Maurice Roberts, 21, are being held in Grandzol's death.
Investigators have alleged the younger brother pulled the trigger last September in the 1500 block of Melon Street, two blocks south of Fairmount Avenue.
Marvin Roberts' attorney, Eileen Hurley, filed a motion March 16 asking a Philadelphia Common Pleas judge to try Roberts as a juvenile.
"Defendant is clearly amendable (sic) to treatment," she wrote to Judge Kathryn S. Lewis.
After filing the response, Krasner told NBC10 that he has not spoken to Grandzol's widow directly, but that his office did notify her of his office's opposition to a trial in juvenile court.
"What I can say to her is, 'Your grief is valued and we will do whatever we can to support that,'" Krasner said. "We are here to do whatever we can to make sure justice is achieved."