Prosecutor says NC teens were shot as they fled. Attorney says evidence not enough.
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The deaths of Lyric Woods & Devin Clark
On Sept. 18, 2022, two missing teens were found dead with gunshot wounds in Orange County near Efland. Here is ongoing coverage from The News & Observer of the investigation, its aftermath and trial.
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A teenager accused of killing two young people in western Orange County in September will remain in jail, after a judge rejected his bid to be released on a $200,000 secured bail bond.
Superior Court Judge Allen Baddour sided with the District Attorney’s Office on Tuesday in deciding Issiah Ross might flee if he were released while awaiting trial for the killings of Lyric Woods, 14, and Devin Clark, 18.
Ross, 18, is charged with two counts of first-degree murder in the Sept. 17 deaths just off a grassy trail on Buckhorn Road, near Efland.
On Tuesday, Assistant District Attorney Anna Orr described how Ross picked up Clark early in the morning of Sept. 17 and took him to pick up Woods near her home, just a short drive from where the bodies were found.
They were shot while running for their lives, Orr said.
Ross’s attorney Jonathan Trapp acknowledged the plan to pick up the two teens, but said the evidence does not support charging Ross with murder. A witness has told law enforcement that the teens were shot after Ross struggled with Clark over a gun that Clark had with him that night. The gun belonged to Clark’s father, attorneys said in court.
Ross has been held without bail since Oct. 14 and was initially charged as a juvenile due to his age. A county grand jury indicted him in early November, moving his case to adult Superior Court.
Ross could face life in prison if convicted. Suspects under 18 cannot get the death penalty in North Carolina, and Orange-Chatham District Attorney Jeff Nieman has said he will not seek the death penalty in any cases.
Trapp also asked Baddour on Tuesday to return a 2017 GMC Terrain that belongs to Ross’s mother, Marcy Cordero, and several items found inside, including Cordero’s Coach purse, paperwork, and Ross’s birth certificate and Social Security card.
The property was seized during an interview with Cordero at the Orange County Sheriff’s Office on Sept. 21, according to documents.
Baddour ruled the personal items could be returned, but not the SUV because investigators are still waiting for DNA results on blood and other evidence found inside.
Teens planned to meet; multiple gunshots
Investigators found 13 9mm shell casings where the bodies were found, Orr said in court Tuesday. Three were found near Buckhorn Road, and another six were found on the property, along with “significant blood droplets” on the gravel.
Four more casings were found in the tall brush near Woods, she said, noting that investigators think the teens were dragged or placed where they were found.
Woods and Clark were found lying together, with their arms outstretched, Orr said. Autopsies showed Woods was shot at least four times — in the back, arm and neck. The neck wound was at a close range, she said.
Clark was shot five times: three in the back, one that entered through the bottom of his foot and once in the back of the head, Orr said.
The description elicited tears from many of the victims’ relatives and friends, who filled several rows in the courtroom Tuesday. Ross’s mother sat on the other side of the courtroom with a friend, moving to a row immediately behind her son as Trapp spoke about his character.
Orange County investigators think Clark and Woods were shot shortly after 2 a.m. on Sept. 17, Orr said. Residents reported hearing multiple gunshots between 2:10 a.m. and 2:20 a.m., she said.
Orr shared the results of an SBI cell phone data analysis that showed Ross and Clark were near Clark’s house around 1:23 a.m. Their cell phones pinged a tower near Woods’ home about 20 minutes later, she said.
Woods’ family found messages in her Snapchat account showing that she reached out to Clark for a ride around 1:20 a.m., Orr said. Clark’s phone showed he sent several messages in an attempt to get a ride to where they were going to meet, she said.
Between 1:45 a.m. and 2:15 a.m., Ross’s and Clark’s cell phones pinged a tower near the crime scene, she said. Ross’s cell phone pinged another tower near the Petro gas station on Buckhorn Road around 2 a.m., she said.
Video footage retrieved from the gas station showed a white GMC Terrain hitting a concrete pillar as it pulled up to a gas pump, she said. Ross is seen clearly in video footage from the gas station pay window, she said.
Orr then described how data showed Ross driving back to the crime scene, before returning toward the Petro station. Data showed he was home by 3:09 a.m., she said.
Woods’ family reported her missing later on Saturday. She was last seen at home around 11 p.m. Friday. Clark’s family reported him missing to Mebane police on Sunday morning, just a few hours before two men found the bodies just off the ATV trail in a grassy field.
Preliminary evidence indicates this was a “heinous” crime, and prosecutors think the case will be stronger as more is revealed, Orr said.
“Devin and Lyric were shot in the back while they were running away from this vehicle,” she said. “They were shot outside the car. They were not shot inside the car, and the grouping of the shots showed that they traveled some distance. They both had shots at close range. They were executed. This was not some struggle over a gun, and the gun went off.”
Attorney describes struggle over gun
Trapp agreed Ross picked up the teens that night, but said the evidence does not prove he murdered them. Trapp urged the judge to set a bond, arguing electronic monitoring or house arrest “for his safety” would be appropriate while Ross awaits trial.
Ross’s role in the deaths is still mired in questions, he said, and the fact that Clark brought the gun with him “is peculiar nonetheless.”
“The state’s theory is that they met that night and for some reason a gun that was brought by Devin Clark was turned against him and Lyric Woods by Issiah Ross, with no other explanation or understanding whatsoever, and I believe that there’s still a lot of gaps and holes in this theory, this idea,” Trapp said.
Orr said Ross spoke with a friend twice after the murders, and the witness told investigators he met with Ross later on Sept. 17, and while they smoked marijuana, Ross said “he had done something bad,” Orr said.
The witness told investigators that Clark was brandishing a 9mm firearm. The gun went off in the SUV, the witness said, and Ross took it from Clark, shooting him as Woods screamed in the back seat, Orr said.
The witness said Ross then shot Woods before dumping the bodies “so that nobody would find them,” she said.
That following Monday, the witness showed Ross a flyer about the missing teens, Orr said. Ross confirmed he was involved in a video chat with the witness, Orr said, and showed the witness the gun that was used to shoot the teens.
Orr and Trapp described how Ross spent the night on Sept. 17 at the home of his mother’s ex-boyfriend after his mother Cordero confronted him about sneaking out of her house and said he may have wrecked her SUV. They were fighting about it, Orr said, and Cordero told Ross he couldn’t stay with her anymore.
On Sunday, the ex-boyfrend, who was identified as Clark’s relative, took Ross to a Raleigh bus station and he left at 10 p.m. for his home state of Delaware, with a ticket that his sister bought, Trapp and Orr said.
Sheriff’s Office investigators spoke with Ross’s mother on Sept. 21 and seized her SUV, noting blood on the exterior passenger side and damage to the front, Orr said. She noted there also were multiple dried blood spots visible inside, and additional blood was found later using luminol, a chemical that glows as it reacts with blood.
The most startling finding, Orr said, was a bloody handprint by the dome light in the SUV. DNA results have not returned from the lab yet, she said.
“Absent from the vehicle, your honor, was any evidence of shots being fired inside the vehicle. There were no bullet holes in the seats or the exterior doors. No shell casings were located. The windows were not shot out, and the suspected blood in the vehicle would not be consistent with two people having been shot inside the vehicle,” Orr said.
Investigators have said, however, that the blood evidence is consistent with someone who was shot being transferred in the vehicle from another location, she said.
Delaware arrest, defense questions theory
An FBI violent crimes task force, working with North Carolina law enforcement, apprehended Ross on Oct. 5 at the Leander Lakes apartments in Dover, Delaware. Orr said Ross gave law enforcement a false name when he was arrested. Trapp said Ross, who had not yet retained him, gave officers Trapp’s name during the arrest.
Two women — Ross’s sister Nakaysha Ross, 22, of Middletown, Delaware, and her friend McKenzie Mitchell, 21, of Dover, Delaware — have been charged with felony hindering prosecution for helping Ross leave North Carolina and stay at Mitchell’s apartment, FBI and local officials have said.
Trapp, in his arguments, noted the discrepancy between the witness’s statement that both teens were shot inside the SUV and the official finding that there was no evidence supporting that claim. Ross left for Delaware that Sunday, because he no longer could stay with his mother in North Carolina, not because he was fleeing justice, Trapp said.
He noted that Ross had recently moved to North Carolina to live with his mother and three younger siblings. He was a student at Eastern Alamance High School, where Clark also was a student, for six days at the start of this school year, district records showed.
Woods was an Orange County resident who attended Cedar Ridge High School.
Ross “was a loving son, a big brother” who helped feed, bathe and care for his siblings when his mother had to work, said Trapp, who presented letters attesting to his character to the court.
“These letters will kind of reiterate that Mr. Ross was a young man who loved to play sports, play basketball, into music and technology,” Trapp said.
“Every person who writes and talks about him talks about how he is soft-spoken, how he is respectful, how he is calm, and how the things that he is being accused of are outside of his character,” he said.
Orr told the court that Ross had legal issues in Delaware and may have still been on probation for another crime when he moved to Alamance County to live with his mother. His father, sisters and other relatives still live in Delaware, she said.
Ross’s previous criminal record is not available to the public, because he was a juvenile until his birthday in early December.
This story was originally published January 10, 2023 at 8:21 AM.
