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A 12-year-old District youth pleaded guilty as a juvenile Monday to stealing a moped from a working Uber Eats driver in June.
During a brief hearing in D.C. Superior Court, the youth sat next to his attorney and pleaded guilty to one count of robbery.
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The youth was initially charged with armed robbery and carrying a pistol without a license. But in exchange for his guilty plea, prosecutors with the District’s Office of the Attorney General allowed the youth to plead to a lesser charge of robbery in exchange for dismissing the other charges against him.
The Washington Post is allowed to attend court hearings involving juveniles on the condition that it not publish their identities.
The June 16 incident was the second arrest for the youth last summer. In early June, when he was 11 years old, he was arrested for assault and two robberies. But prosecutors later dismissed those cases. Two weeks after that, he was rearrested for robbing the Uber Eats driver of his moped.
An 11-year-old’s robbery charges were dropped. Then he was arrested again.
According to a police report in the most recent robbery, the youth and two others grabbed the food delivery driver’s moped about 5 p.m. from outside the Chick-fil-A in the 3100 block of 14th Street NW and began pushing it eastbound in the 1300 block of Irving Street NW. Describing security footage reviewed by detectives, the report alleges the owner of the moped ran after them.
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“It’s mine, please. I’m working,” the owner is heard saying, according to the report.
According to the report, the moped’s owner is soon seen with his hands in the air “in a surrender-style gesture,” and the youth runs after him, clutching his waistband. “If you don’t move out of the way, I’m going to shoot you,” the youth said, according to the report. The youth was soon arrested.
As part of the plea, the youth agreed to enter a diversion program for six to nine months. If he successfully completes the program, Judge Andrea L. Hertzfeld said, his guilty plea can be withdrawn and the case will be dismissed. If he does not successfully complete the program, the judge could order the youth held at the city’s Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services until he turns 21, his attorney said in court.
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The youth has been in the care of his mother, with GPS monitoring and a curfew. A court social worker said his teachers reported that the youth was performing well in school but that he had repeatedly failed to charge the battery in his GPS ankle monitor, allowing it to go dead.
Hertzfeld encouraged the youth to continue to performing “well” in school but also warned him that he had to keep his ankle monitor charged.
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