GOLDEN, Colo. — A suspect was found guilty of four counts of first-degree murder after shooting and killing two brothers during a 2020 robbery in Lakewood.
On Friday morning, a jury in Jefferson County returned guilty verdicts in the trial of Marqueil Deandre Banks, now 18 years old. Banks was accused of murdering two brothers in Lakewood in 2020, according to the First Judicial District Attorney.
Banks is one of four juveniles that were convicted in the murders. Two of them, including Banks, were tried as adults and the other two stayed in juvenile court.
Banks was convicted of four counts of first-degree murder and two counts of aggravated robbery. He will be sentenced on May 5.
The charges stemmed from Aug. 23, 2020, when officers with the Lakewood Police Department learned that 18-year-old Damian Wikoff and 17-year-old Dillon Wikoff arranged to sell a homemade ghost gun and trade for another gun outside of a Lakewood Walmart.
When the brothers met with the possible buyer, Michael Anthony Mendoza, now 20, they found that he had recruited a group of juveniles to rob them, according to the district attorney's office. Both brothers were shot and killed by Banks during the robbery.
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On Aug. 31, 2020, officers arrested two teenagers — later identified as Banks and Mendoza — in connection with the crimes.
Both were charged as adults.
Banks' co-defendant, Mendoza, pleaded guilty on Jan. 31, 2022 to aggravated robbery and manslaughter. His sentencing is scheduled for April 27. He faces 10 to 25 years in prison.
A juvenile, who was 15 at the time of the crime, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit aggravated robbery in May 2021 and was sentenced to two years of juvenile intensive supervised probation.
Another unnamed juvenile, who was also 15 at the time, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and was sentenced to four years in the Department of Youth Services.
