CLEVELAND — A Cuyahoga County grand jury has indicted a Cleveland man accused of taking part in a pair of brutal crimes.
Thirty-six-year-old Aaron Parsons is currently being held in the Cuyahoga County Jail on a $1 million cash bond. The suspect is charged with both the kidnapping and attempted murder of a double amputee man, as well as with the murder of another individual about a month later. Court records indicate officials are considering seeking the death penalty.
"Aaron Parsons is a barbaric predator," County Prosecutor Michael C. O'Malley said in a brief statement. "Judgment day is coming."
The first incident occurred on Feb. 21, when Parsons and two other men allegedly got into the 59-year-old victim's car and put a gun to his head, demanding he drive where told to as they beat him in the head with the firearm. The eventually instructed him to stop at the railroad tracks near Pearl Road and West 25th Street, at which point the suspects kept hitting him and dragged him out of the vehicle.
The victim told police Parsons and the others threw him onto the tracks and said, "If the cold weather doesn't kill you, a train will," before throwing his wheelchair into a nearby ravine and driving away in his car which contained both of his prosthetic legs. Somehow, the victim was able to escape from the line and call authorities, and officers later found his vehicle burned near East 59th Street and Park Avenue.
Parsons remained at large, and on the afternoon of March 24 officials say he and a woman named Danielle Mayne-Hicks approached 23-year-old Charles Eggers under a bridge near the same railroad tracks and beat him before Parsons shot him in the head. Eggers was pronounced dead at the scene, and Parsons was eventually arrested on April 5. It was only afterward that law enforcement learned of his alleged connection to the previous crime.
In all, Parsons faces a combined 25 combined criminal counts for the two incidents. The charges are as follows:
- Three counts of aggravated murder
- Four counts of murder
- One count of aggravated murder
- Three counts of aggravated robbery
- Four counts of robbery
- Two counts of kidnapping
- Two counts of tampering with evidence
- Two counts of arson
- One count of grand theft
- Two counts of having weapons under disability.
Parsons is due to be back in Cleveland Municipal Court Tuesday morning. In addition, Mayne-Hicks faces charges of aggravated robbery, robbery, and kidnapping in relation to Eggers' death.