More was revealed this week about what caused an innocent woman to be gunned down in December after a dispute broke out between two rival gangs.
Gwinnett County police Detective Christian Robinson said Thursday victim Malia Ross-Robinson (no relation to the detective) was not involved in gangs and that relatives said she was only in town for a few weeks visiting friends.
Ross-Robinson, 21, was shot in the abdomen and died Dec. 9 when some suspected La Gran Familia gang associates drove away from her friend’s home in Norcross, spraying bullets as they went. Omar Santana, 25, of Lawrenceville was arrested and charged with her murder. Gwinnett County Magistrate Court Judge Mark Layng denied bond for Santana Thursday and bound over his charges to Superior Court.
Ross-Robinson was visiting acquaintances from Lilburn Middle School, which she attended before her family moved to Maryland when she was a high school freshman, said her mother, Peni Webster-Lewis.
She was checking out the area because she was considering moving back to Atlanta with her husband of two months and their 3-year-old daughter, her mother said.
“I don’t think she knew what her old middle school friends would be like at this point,” Webster-Lewis said. “No one anticipated this.”
Ross-Robinson was dancing at Liquid Ultra Lounge in Norcross when a man in her group of friends had a confrontation with a member of the La Gran Familia criminal street gang, according to the Gwinnett police detective’s testimony at Thursday’s preliminary hearing for Santana in Magistrate Court.
It all started when someone spilled a drink on a woman who was at the club with LGF gang members, Robinson testified. A gangster then went up to a man who was dancing with Ross-Robinson and demanded he take off a bandana tied around his arm. Detectives identified the man dancing with the victim as Lance Aikens, whom court records show is an active member of a different street gang called Baby Latinos.
After both groups left, Robinson and her friends phoned 911 to report someone was following their vehicle. They stopped at a QuikTrip for a few minutes. But before police could arrive, they continued on to Aikens’ house on Phil Niekro Parkway.
Around 4:15 a.m., police said, Santana and four of his friends drove up to the house in an Infiniti sedan threatening to fight Aikens. No one traded blows. However, as the interlopers got back into their Infiniti and drove away a passenger fired several shots, striking Ross.
Santana’s lawyer, Scott Drake, has said Santana is not in a gang, nor was he the shooter. Santana told police another man who was in the car, Jose Morales, fired the shots. Police said they have the right man because witnesses described the shooter wearing an orange-and-white striped shirt, and photos taken at the club show Santana was wearing such a shirt that night.
Webster-Lewis said she didn’t recognize the names of anyone involved.
“She truly was not in anybody’s gang, so I was so offended when the first reports said it was rival gangs,” Webster-Lewis said of her daughter. “If this guy shot her, hopefully they can prove that and hopefully he goes to jail for a very long time.”
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