Tacoma cannabis shop murder suspect pleads not guilty to charges in Pierce County
A high school junior accused in the fatal shooting of a cannabis shop employee in Tacoma pleaded not guilty Wednesday in Pierce County Superior Court.
Montrell Hatfield, 16, appeared at arraignment via livestream from the Remann Hall juvenile detention center. He was arrested by Seattle police Tuesday in Kent. Hatfield and a 15-year-old boy are charged with first-degree murder in the March 19 shooting death of Jordan Brown, 29.
The victim was an employee of the World of Weed cannabis shop located in Tacoma’s Eastside neighborhood when it was robbed last month.
The News Tribune generally does not publish the names of juvenile defendants but is doing so in Hatfield’s case because he is charged as an adult with first-degree murder.
Superior Court Judge Philip Sorensen ordered Hatfield held in lieu of $3 million bail, citing concerns for community safety. He also pointed to the fact that the defendant was identified as a suspect in an armed robbery that occurred Monday at a cannabis shop in Lacey.
In her argument for the $3 million bail, Lisa Wagner, head of the violent crimes unit for the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, noted that during the Lacey robbery, the suspect fired a gunshot into the ceiling. Wagner said there were people on the floor above the cannabis shop, but no one was hurt.
The 15-year-old accused in Brown’s death is being held at Remann Hall on a no-bond hold. A decision on whether to prosecute the teen as a juvenile or an adult has not yet been made. A hearing to decide the matter is scheduled for July 19.
The two had been eluding authorities since March 16 when prosecutors say the teens cut off home detention-monitoring devices they had been ordered to wear following their arrest for allegedly robbing a pawn shop in Federal Way.
Since then, Wagner said Hatfield has been on a “crime spree.” Police suspect the two teenagers have robbed at least 10 pot shops in Pierce and King counties. The declaration for determination of probable cause states that five of those robberies occurred in Tacoma.
Wagner said she intends to file additional first-degree robbery charges against Hatfield for those robberies.
According to charging documents, surveillance video from the deadly World of Weed robbery showed the 15-year-old shoot Brown after Hatfield got into an altercation with him. Hatfield fought Brown after the employee tossed back a trash bag he had been ordered to fill with cash. The 15-year-old allegedly ended the fight by shooting Brown in the neck.
Brown, a Gig Harbor resident, died at the scene.
The 15-year-old was arrested by Seattle police about three weeks later April 11 outside the Regional Justice Center in Kent. The teen’s mother told KOMO News that she convinced her son to turn himself in.
