GOLDEN — A plan to rob an Arvada Burger King last summer ended in a 30-year-old female employee lying dead on the floor of the walk-in freezer, prosecutors said today in opening statements of a first-degree murder trial.
Celia Meza was shot at close range in the back as she called 911 to report the robbery early on July 15 at the Burger King at West 64th Avenue and Ward Road, prosecutor Sean Clifford said.
Pulling the trigger was Anthony Lowe, then 21, one of four men who Clifford said conspired to rob the fast-food restaurant.
On trial for murder with Lowe is Thomas Johns, who was 17; restaurant manager Anthony Cole, 21; and Lindell Mark Sample Jr., 18.
Lowe, Johns and Sample were former employees of the Burger King in the northwest metro suburb.
Clifford said Johns was the mastermind of the plot and bought the two guns used in the robbery. Lowe was to take care of the employees, Cole was the “inside” man and Sample was the getaway driver, Clifford said.
The four men — who were attired in black clothing and masks — shed clothing and the Tech-9 semi-automatic murder weapon as they fled south on Ward Road and Welch Street, Clifford said.
Lowe and Johns jumped on a Greyhound bus headed for Florida but were apprehended in Savannah, Ga.
Clifford said the men talked of how much they didn’t like the restaurant and joked about a robbery for some time before the plan developed.
Lowe’s attorney, Sarah Lee, said it was a robbery that went wrong, noting that Lowe told detectives that he never intended to shoot Meza.
“The safety was on and somehow the gun went off,” Lee quoted Lowe as saying. “It wasn’t my plan. It was supposed to be simple. Nobody was supposed to be killed.”
Lee also said Lowe had smoked marijuana the night of the robbery and “was not thinking rationally or clearly.” The gun went off, she said, when Lowe struggled to take away Meza’s cellphone.
Johns’ attorney, Carolyn Palloux, said her client did not pull the trigger and was immature at 17. She told the jury to be aware that Cole, who will testify in the 10-day trial, has “cut a deal with the DA.”
Ann Schrader: 303-278-3217 or aschrader@denverpost.com
