Subscriber Benefit
As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe Now
A Delaware County jury has acquitted a Muncie teenager of murder, the county prosecutor announced Friday.
The jury in Delaware Circuit Court 2 was unable to reach a decision on a second count of dangerous possession of a firearm, but Aytae Seals pleaded guilty to that charge following the decision.
According to a probable cause affidavit, Muncie police were dispatched to a park for a shooting on June 22, 2021. There they found a man in the back seat of a parked car with “obvious, severe trauma to his head.”
The man was transported to a hospital and found to have injuries consistent with gunshot wounds to his head and both legs. The man died at the hospital.
A witness said she was in a vehicle at the park with others, including Seals, when the man approached with a handgun and told everyone to leave, according to the probable cause affidavit.
Seals started to move away in a different direction than the others, and the man got into the back seat of the car and started “digging around” the floorboard, the witness told police.
The witness reported that Seals “turned around while moving away and fired a handgun,” shooting the man. The witness also said Seals approached the vehicle and told those inside to not call police.
The witness knew Seals by the name “Bandman” but provided a photo of him from social media and identified him as the shooter, the probable cause affidavit says.
Another witness told police they heard gunfire and looked back to see Seals approaching the vehicle. Seals then “pointed a handgun with an extended magazine” at the two witnesses and told them to not call police. He demanded his phone and fled.
Court records show a warrant for Seals’ arrest was issued July 15, 2021, ordering him to be held without bond at the Delaware County Juvenile Detention Center. Seals was 16 at the time of the incident.
The maximum penalty in Indiana for the charge Seals pleaded guilty to is one year in jail, according to the Delaware County Prosecutor’s Office. The verdict announcement noted that because Seals was in custody for well over a year awaiting trial, by law he has served his sentence.
In a statement, Delaware County Prosecutor Eric Hoffman called the case difficult, sad and emotional.
“I understand that (the) victim’s family and friends may not agree with the jury’s verdict,” Hoffman said. “I am urging all parties to remain calm and to not take the law into their own hands.
“The jury in this case obviously disagreed with the prosecution that the Defendant was guilty,” Hoffman continued. “A jury’s verdict in a criminal case is something we all have to accept because that is how our criminal justice system works.”
Mark McKinney, a court-appointed attorney for Seals, said in a phone interview that the jury did the right thing, calling it a “self-defense case right from the start.”
McKinney also said it made sense to plead guilty to the misdemeanor charge in order to avoid a second trial, and because Seals had already served the time.
In his statement, Hoffman decried the state of gun violence in the community and said juvenile courts should abandon the “soft on crime” Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative policies.
According to the Coalition for Juvenile Justice, those policies are meant to reduce the number of children inappropriately detained; minimize the number of youth who fail to appear in court and incidence of delinquent behavior; reduce public expenditures and redirect public funds toward successful reform strategies; and improve public safety and conditions of juvenile confinement.
“This academic ideology is flawed and the consequences are grave,” Hoffman said. “Juveniles are not held accountable for their actions like they were in the past. We as a society and as a criminal justice system need to stop excusing their behavior and minimizing their crimes.
“Juveniles need swift and stern consequences to their actions in order to deter them from committing crime in the future,” the prosecutor continued. “The bloodshed in the street must stop. Human lives are being needlessly lost.”
The case is State of Indiana v. Aytae A. Seals, 18C02-2107-MR-000005.
Please enable JavaScript to view this content.