Allegheny County homicide detectives never followed up on information they received more than 2½ years ago that a gun seized in a traffic stop matched one used to kill a teenager in Wilkinsburg four months earlier.

The gun’s existence was a surprising piece of evidence that suddenly appeared this week partway through the trial of the two men charged in the homicide, prompting defense attorneys to declare the entire case “a miscarriage of justice.”

Until Wednesday, not even the prosecutor or lead detective knew the gun existed.

Detectives trying to figure out who killed 17-year-old Darin Hobdy in May 2021 never asked the man who was pulled over in August 2021 where he got the weapon or worked to trace it back to the murder scene.

Lawyers for defendants Deontae Nalls and Daeshuan Smith pounced on the revelations, claiming that they pointed to a lackluster investigation and should sow reasonable doubt in the minds of the jury.

“What you saw was a miscarriage of justice. Somehow, some way, that murder weapon appeared in the middle of that man’s trial,” Casey White, who represents Smith, said Friday in his closing argument. “I’m trying to hold back my frustration, my anger — out of respect to the commonwealth. But what happened to that man is not fair.

“The bottom line is, it’s appalling.”

Attorney Owen Seman, who represents Nalls, agreed.

“Is there not some fundamental issue of fairness there?” he asked.

Both lawyers said detectives failed to perform their due diligence and conducted what they called a “shoddy investigation.”

The jury began deliberating late Friday and will resume Monday morning.

‘It was missed’

Late on May 23, 2021, Wilkinsburg police were called to Vantine Street for the report of a person who had been shot.

They found Hobdy. The Penn Hills teen had been shot 13 times. Casings from two weapons — a 9 mm and .40-caliber — were recovered.

According to investigators, two days earlier, Hobdy had discovered a burglary at Nalls’ home in Plum.

Nalls, 24, reported having $30,000 in cash and an assault rifle stolen. He also lost a pound of marijuana.

On Friday, Deputy District Attorney Alison Bragle told the jury that Nalls believed Hobdy was responsible for the burglary, and that’s why he was killed.

Nalls was arrested within a few weeks, while Smith, 22, of Penn Hills was charged a few months later.

The men’s trial began on Monday before Allegheny County Judge Thomas E. Flaherty.

But on Wednesday, before testimony started, Bragle handed over to defense attorneys a “hit report” that the county’s crime lab received from a federal network that does ballistics testing for police.

The report — issued in 2021 but undiscovered until this week — showed that the .40-caliber handgun recovered from the traffic stop in West Mifflin might have been used to kill Hobdy.

An exact match between that gun and Hobdy’s death was made Thursday after the crime lab was asked to rush the results of additional examination.

The report showing the link between the gun and the Hobdy case — as well as to another shooting in Pittsburgh on Jan. 6, 2021 — was sent in an email to two Allegheny County homicide supervisors at 2:01 p.m. on Sept. 21, 2021.

One of those supervisors, Sgt. Todd Dolfi, forwarded the email to homicide detectives at 2:43 p.m. that same day.

On Friday morning, Allegheny County Police Detective Ronald Bodnar, the lead investigator in the Hobdy case, testified that he never saw the report.

“It’s the responsibility of the lead investigator to review the hit report,” Bodnar said. “It was missed.”

Bodnar testified that had he seen the email, he would have contacted West Mifflin police and further investigated.

A county police spokesman said Friday afternoon that he would not comment until after the trial on the circumstances in the case or the procedures involved in making detectives aware of the hit report.

Murky information

Earlier Friday, the man arrested with the weapon in West Mifflin, Malik Banks, testified under both state and federal grants of immunity.

Banks testified that he got the gun around June 2021 on the street in Homewood, “somewhere, I don’t know where.”

Banks told the jury he didn’t know any of the people involved in the homicide trial and that he bought the gun off an older man. Banks said he was drinking vodka that day and didn’t know why the details were relevant.

“Were you involved in any way in the murder of Darin Hobdy on May 23, 2021?” Bragle, the prosecutor, asked him.

“No,” Banks responded.

In closing arguments, the defense made much of the failure by the county police to follow up on the firearms match.

Still, White recognized that the county police acknowledged the mistake.

“To Detective Bodnar’s credit, he fell on the grenade,” White said. “He took responsibility. He said that evidence should have been collected, analyzed and brought to [their] awareness.”

Paying the piper

During his opening statement on Monday, White told the jury his client is innocent. He maintained that position in his closing, telling the jury that phone records were the only evidence against Smith.

“That’s what they want you to convict Daeshuan Smith with,” White said.

Seman told the jury that his client, Nalls, cooperated with police investigating the burglary at his apartment and willingly turned over his cell phone and guns.

Seman also said Nalls admitted to being at the scene of the shooting that night — although only after first claiming that he wasn’t there. When confronted with evidence of his car being at the scene, Nalls said he picked up Hobdy that night to buy more marijuana. When they got to Vantine Street to buy the drugs, Nalls said he heard gunshots and fled.

“Mere presence at the scene of a crime is not enough,” Seman told the jury. “You either need to be the shooter or be in the conspiracy. What evidence of a conspiracy have you heard?”

Bragle said the evidence — much of it circumstantial — points directly to Nalls and Smith.

She told the jury that the phone records do more than just place the two defendants in the area of Hobdy’s shooting.

Nalls and Smith called each other 11 times the day Hobdy was killed, including seven times between 10:02 p.m. and 10:26 p.m. Police were called about Hobdy being shot around 10:40 p.m.

“It is call after call after call after call,” Bragle said.

Video surveillance shows a car matching Nalls’ together that night with a white SUV similar to what Smith drove. Both vehicles were seen driving from the murder scene. Cell phone records show the men traveling the same route back to the area of Nalls’ house together.

“Ladies and gentlemen, use your common sense to evaluate the evidence,” Bragle said.

Although the prosecutor acknowledged that the findings in the ballistics report should have been investigated, she said that as soon as detectives learned about it this week, they followed up.

“You’re not missing that evidence,” she said.

Bragle urged jurors to evaluate the evidence — and not be persuaded by the defense attorneys’ attempt to change the focus.

Smith was the drug dealer Nalls was meeting that night on Vantine Street, she said.

“They lured Darin Hobdy to Vantine Street,” Bragle said. “Someone had to pay the piper. He served up Darin Hobdy.”

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