POTTSVILLE — The attorney for the Port Carbon man charged with murdering two New Philadelphia teens has withdrawn the request for a change of venue.
Ashley Sabol, representing Lamour Branch in the homicide case, withdrew the request to President Judge Jacqueline Russell on Monday, noting that another motion can be filed later.Sabol did not give a reason for the change.
She previously cited extensive media coverage as the reason for asking that the case be moved out of Schuylkill County.
Branch, 20, remains in Schuylkill County Prison on charges he killed Hunter Mock, 18, and Angelito Xavier Caraballo, 16, in October 2023 in a wooded area off Ferndale Road near New Philadelphia.
Sabol previously wrote in a court filing that “a change in venue is compelled whenever a trial court concludes a fair and impartial jury cannot be selected from the residents of the county where the crime occurred.”
Among other requirements, the defense must show pretrial publicity was “so extensive, sustained, and pervasive that the community must be deemed to have been saturated with it, and there was insufficient time between the publicity and the trial for any prejudice to have dissipated,” the document states.
The prior motion had requested a trial be held in another county that doesn’t have regular viewing of local media outlets. A specific county is not mentioned.District Attorney Michael O’Pake noted Monday that generally such a question should first be posed to a juror.
O’Pake said the next step in the case could be Russell scheduling a pretrial conference in the case, although he doesn’t know when that might occur.State police charged Branch on June 5, 2024 with homicide.
After consulting with the teens’ mothers, O’Pake disclosed in late November that he would not seek the death penalty.
Branch waived his right to a formal arraignment in October when he pleaded not guilty. He has been in jail since December when Russell revoked his bail for violating conditions of a Sept. 4 bail release by failing to meet with his probation officer and also failing to appear for a Dec. 5 hearing in a burglary case.
Branch initially denied being at the scene of the October 2023 murder, but later admitted it, state police said. Search warrants show that he told police about going with Mock and Caraballo and another man to New Philadelphia to take turns firing a gun.
He claims the other man shot Mock.
The bodies of Mock and Caraballo were found after a friend of the two teens called state police at Frackville Oct. 10, 2023, to report she had found the victims at “The Sanchez,” the nickname for an old mining area.
During a June press conference, O’Pake said he was confident the person responsible for the deaths of Mock and Caraballo was in custody.
“We feel that the appropriate charges are now going to be heard by the Court of Common Pleas of Schuylkill County,” he said at the time, “and I believe today is the first day that we can hope to bring justice to the victims in this matter and bring peace to the family and closure to the family.”