MIAMI – Two of the men charged in the shooting of an undercover Miami-Dade narcotics detective were back in court Thursday morning.
Steve Gallon IV, son of Miami-Dade school board member Steve Gallon III, along with Atiba Moore, were taken from the Broward County jail to Miami to appear before a judge.
The pair are being held in Broward County for security reasons, officials said.
Both are charged with attempted first-degree murder after the officer, identified in public charging documents and in open court as Darrian Washington, was grazed by a bullet March 8 in Miami’s Buena Vista neighborhood.
The case is connected to an ongoing corruption investigation into jail drug smuggling, sources tell Local 10 News.
Both of the suspects’ attorneys filed a motion to disqualify the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office from prosecuting the case, but a judge denied it.
Moore’s attorney brought up that Washington made a complaint against Howard Rosen, who is now retired from the State Attorney’s Office. The detectives sued Rosen for defamation in federal court.
It all stemmed from a sting operation that alleges that the detective stole money from a crime scene. But he was never prosecuted and the case was dropped.
The defense brought the unrelated case up in the event that it would affect the state’s prosecution in this case because they had knowledge of that case.
The judge also lifted an order to keep Gallon and Moore separate in the case. Local 10 News has learned that the attorneys may end up presenting a joint defense.