A Colorado jury on Wednesday convicted a man of fatally shooting the parents of five children who were trying to buy an SUV in 2020 using the online marketplace app Letgo.
Arapahoe County jurors convicted Kyree Brown, 20, of multiple counts, including first-degree murder, in the killings of Joe and Jossline Roland on Aug. 14, 2020, KUSA-TV reported.
The deaths led to a wrongful death lawsuit on behalf of the victims' family that claims Letgo, which has been acquired by OfferUp, was negligent because it allowed the alleged shooter to become a "verified seller" using a fake name and despite his criminal history.
That federal court case is still working its way through the legal system.
Authorities say Joseph Roland was looking for a vehicle for his teenage daughter and found a Toyota RAV4 advertised by a "verified seller" on Letgo named James Worthy, who was really Brown, then 18. Roland agreed to meet Brown in a parking lot near a mall in Aurora.
When Roland and his wife, Jossline, arrived, Brown told them he had accidentally brought the wrong vehicle title and asked the couple to meet him elsewhere, according to the lawsuit.
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They followed the man to the address, where Brown was accused of pulling a handgun and shooting the couple after Joseph Roland tried to wrestle the weapon away. Investigators say the teen then fled with $3,000 in cash the Rolands had brought with them to pay for the SUV.
Brown was arrested about two weeks after the shooting. He faces up to life in prison for the first-degree murder convictions. A sentencing hearing was set for Nov. 21.
Letgo and OfferUp have filed a pending motion to dismiss the lawsuit, arguing, in part, that the company encourages users to exercise caution and use third-party meetup spots like police stations and that users acknowledge there are risks when buying and selling on an internet-based marketplace.
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The motion argues that Letgo and OfferUp cannot "guarantee to each of its millions of users that engaging in real-world transactions with someone initially contacted through an ad posted on the Letgo platform would be entirely free from risk."
"The site provided its users with guidelines for how to buy and sell safely, cautioning that there is always some danger involved in transacting with buyers or sellers who are met initially online — whether on Letgo or some other platform," the motion states.
