NORRISTOWN, Pa. (KYW Newsradio) — A Delaware County man has been ordered to stand trial on charges of first-degree murder and related offenses in Montgomery County, accused of gunning down a man as he left a Norristown bar last month.
At the preliminary hearing for 26-year-old Marquan Banks, prosecutors showed video of what they called the “execution” of 37-year-old Jermaine Pierce on Jan. 11.
A Montgomery County detective described the video. About 30 minutes before the shooting, a man, who prosecutors say is Banks, is seen with two other men walking up to the Airy Tavern on the corner of Airy and Noble streets in Norristown. Banks waits outside with a cigarette while the two men go in.
Video from inside the bar shows one of those men having a brief conversation with Pierce.
Around 7:30 p.m., as Pierce leaves the bar with another man, Banks and the two men are seen getting out of an SUV parked up the block from Noble Street. Video from the street shows the man identified as Banks pull a gun from his pocket, take a step back and fire one shot, hitting Pierce in the face and killing him.
The man who left the bar with Pierce is seen searching Pierce’s body, then pulling a gun from the dead man’s waistband and firing four shots at the men as they run back to their SUV.
That man, 29-year-old Isaiah Bell, is charged with endangering the welfare of others.
Banks’ attorney got into a brief, heated exchange with family members in the courtroom as he tried to argue against first-degree murder, saying it may have been self-defense, but prosecutors countered saying that’s an issue for trial, not a preliminary hearing.