Trial Begins in ‘Old Fashioned’ Stick-Up Case

Google Maps image of the corner of 205th Street and 116th Avenue in St. Albans. Photo via Google Maps.

By Christina Carrega

A Queens man heading home early one Saturday morning in November 2016 had a feeling he was being followed. He was right.

Ronald Horton testified that he froze when he realized two men were about to rob him steps from St. Albans home.

“I wasn’t frightened,” Horton told Assistant District Attorney Barry Frankenstein on redirect examination Tuesday evening. “If it was one person, I would have gotten out of it, but with a second person, I couldn’t.”

Horton identified Frederick Holloway and Perry Pointer to the jurors in Queens Supreme Court as the suspected robbers who stole his car keys, Blackberry phone, credit cards, Rolex and cash before fleeing in a getaway car.

After Horton parked his car and was walking to his home near 205th Street and 116th Avenue, he heard footsteps from behind him get faster and faster, he said.

“Give me all you got,” Horton said that Pointer told him. He said Pointer ran in front of him and pointed a silver .45 caliber gun to his chest.

Seconds later, Horton felt the barrel of another gun pressed into the small of his back, he said.

Horton said he refused to turn over his property when one of the men directed him to lay on the sidewalk face down. Pointer, 21, allegedly directed Holloway to shoot Horton.

But the stick-up artists spared him, prosecutors said. Instead, Horton said, they ripped the items off of him and fled.

Horton, who works in financial real estate, ran to safety inside his home and called the police. He said he was “impressed” with the amount of officers which responded to the St. Albans block.

Defense attorneys Warren Silverman and Randall Unger separately probed Horton on cross-examination about his initial description of the men who robbed him.

“Didn’t you tell the police the person in front of you was five foot six inches? Unger asked Horton.

“I don’t remember. I remember he was shorter than me,” Horton replied, adding that Pointer stood in front of him and Holloway stood behind.

Holloway — who is held on Rikers Island on $300,000 bail — is 6 feet 2 inches tall, according to Department of Correction records.

Pointer’s height is unclear. He is out on bail.

In December 2017, Horton pointed out Holloway and Pointer in a police lineup. He never recovered any of his property.

“What we have here is an old-fashioned, one-eyed witness case,” Unger said outside of court.

Unger said that no forensic evidence, cell phone tower pings, DNA, fingerprints or surveillance video evidence place Holloway or Pointer at the scene.

If convicted, both defendants face up to 30 years in prison for robbery and gun possession charges.

The trial continues on Wednesday in front of Justice Leslie Leach.