America was stunned just over a month ago when pastor Davey Blackburn’s wife, Amanda, who was pregnant with their second child, was brutally raped and shot in the head while trying to protect her son. According to IJReview, Davey was out exercising, and Amanda was home alone with their one-year-old boy, when three men entered their Indiana home early in the morning.
New information has emerged about one of the teens involved in the murder. ABC 6 reports that during the eight day crime spree, 18-year-old suspect Larry Taylor also shot and killed 27-year-old Rolando Gonzalez-Hernandez for the $10 he found in his wallet. Taylor and his counterpart Jalen Watson allegedly committed the following crimes: Burglarized numerous houses, raped and robbed an unidentified woman, murdered, raped, and robbed Amanda Blackburn, murdered Rolando Gonzalez-Hernandez and stole a car.
Tuesday the Indy Star described the carnage as eight days of random and brutal violence. Prosecutors on Monday filed charges of murder and robbery against Taylor in connection with the Nov. 4 shooting death of Rolando Gonzalez-Hernandez. Gonzalez-Hernandez, 26, was found lying on the ground next to his Chevrolet Trailblazer in a parking lot at the La Joya Apartments, in the 4500 block of Candletree Circle, a probable cause affidavit says. He was killed with a bullet to the head.
Taylor told people he would “hit a lick,” a street term for a robbery, at La Joya Apartments, according to multiple informants who told detectives. An affidavit states Taylor told an informant that he shot a man after taking $10 from his wallet. Later he showed an informant a news clip about Gonzalez-Hernandez’s shooting, the document says, and cell phone records show that Taylor was in the area of La Joya Apartments during the shooting.
The incident is now one of three pending felony cases against Taylor. He also faces pending misdemeanor charges of public nudity and public indecency. Court documents allege Taylor raped a woman in Westlake Apartments on Nov. 3 after he and Jalen Watson, 21, burglarized her apartment.
Along with Taylor, two other perpetrators were identified by authorities as Jalen Watson, 21, and Diano Gordon, 24. According to NBC News, the key piece of evidence was a pink sweater stolen from one of the targeted homes on the day Amanda Blackburn was killed. DNA evidence on the sweater, which was found in the stolen Sebring, was connected to Watson, police said last month. It turns out Watson was already in police custody because of a parole violation in an unrelated case.
Taylor and Watson have been charged with murder in Amanda Blackburn’s death. Gordon was not charged because he did not enter the home, police said, but he still faces two counts of burglary and two counts of theft in two earlier break-ins that same day.
Marion County Prosecutor Terry Curry said Tuesday, “We’ve charged Mr. Taylor with five very violent crimes in the course of an eight-day period and certainly in our five years in office that’s unprecedented,” he said in an interview. Curry said the only comparable cases he’s handled were two violent home invasions that occurred in October 2013. Curry also said his office is still weighing whether to seek the death penalty against Taylor in Blackburn’s killing.
