Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives

HOUSTON – A Houston federal judge has sentenced a 23-year-old local man to more than 26 years in prison following his conviction of three counts of robbery and three counts of brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence, announced U.S. Attorney Ryan K. Patrick.

Deamonta Frederick Taylor, of Houston, pleaded guilty Jan. 30, 2019, admitting he took part in several robberies of cell phone stores in 2017. In one of those crimes, a pregnant female was ordered to strip naked at gunpoint.

Today, U.S. District Judge David Hittner ordered Taylor to serve a total of 315 months in prison. The court imposed 63 months in prison for the three robberies and 84 months in prison for each of the firearms charges, all of which must be served consecutively to each other and to the underlying robbery sentences. The total 26-year sentence will be immediately followed by five years of supervised release.

Co-defendants Kevin Eugene Harrison and Marquise Turner, both 23 and also of Houston, each pleaded guilty to one count of robbery and one count of brandishing a firearm. Harrison and Turner previously received 141 and 125 months in prison, respectively.

For several weeks in October and November 2017, the three men committed a series of commercial armed robberies, including several that took place at cellular telephone stores in the greater Houston area. Several of the victims were female, one of whom was pregnant. Taylor had made the women strip naked at gunpoint during the robberies.

On Nov. 9, 2017, a joint task force operation resulted in surveillance and the ultimate arrest of Taylor and his co-defendants as they fled a robbery they committed at a Metro PCS cellular telephone store on Aldine Mail Route Road in Houston. The two female victims in that robbery identified Taylor as the gunman.

The investigation eventually linked Taylor and his co-defendants to multiple robberies in the Fall of 2017.

All three men have been and will remain in custody pending transfer to a U.S. Bureau of Prisons facility to be determined in the near future.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Harris County Sheriff’s Office, Texas Department of Public Safety and the Houston Police Department conducted the investigation. Assistant U.S. Attorney John Michael Lewis is prosecuting the case.