Accused Murderer of Former Jamaican Hip-Hop Executive Remanded to NY Jail

By Alicia Cruz
The Black Urban Times

The man accused of killing former Jamaican hip-hop executive, Yoseph Robinson, was in Brooklyn Supreme Court Tuesday where a judge set his bail at $50,000 and remanded him into custody, The New York Post reported.

Eion Klass, 33, clad in black jeans, sneakers and a torn blue and white striped shirt, stood silently while his lawyer Alan Stutman addressed the judge stating that his client had been held in the 70th Precinct since Monday under "extremely hostile circumstances."

"He was in custody for three days and they were threatening him. They were going at him pretty hard," Stutman said after the arraignment.

However, Assistant DA Wilfredo Coto told the judge that while in the custody of police on another case, Klass injured two officers while he was being interrogated when he attempted to flee the police station.

The dred-locked street sweeper, who works for the Downtown Alliance, has denied knowing Robinson or ever being in the liquor store, MB Vineyards wine shop, where the hip-hop-executive-turned-Orthodox Jew was killed.

Photo of alleged gunman, Eion Klass

The NY Post reported that Klass, who was apprehended Monday on an outstanding warrant for a June 28 assault and robbery on the husband of a former girlfriend, has made a statement to police but the DAs office would not release it at this time.

According to police reports, Klass attacked Patrick Walters, the husband of his former girlfriend, by striking him with a blunt object. The judge issued a restraining order against Klass in that case.

Raised in Spanish Town, Jamaica by his Grandma Pearl, Robinson and his siblings joined his parents in the United States in 1989. He was raised in the Midwood section of Brooklyn, New York in 1989. At some point he became involved with selling drugs but recently turned his life around to become a devout Orthodox Jew inspiring leaders of both the black and Jewish communities across the city, as well as numerous Brooklyn officials.

Robinson was shot twice in his chest as he attempted to stop a man from stealing a bracelet from his girlfriend, Lahavah Wallace. Community leaders mourned his death, saying he was a recognizable character whom everyone loved. Chaim Deutsch of Flatbush Shomrim said, "Everybody has enemies and, Yoseph, you don't find that one person that has anything bad to say about him. Only a person that's an angel doesn't have enemies like Yoseph."

Robinson was in the throes of a divorce and custody battle against his wife in California at the time of his murder, and had just been granted joint custody less than a month ago, court records show.

He accused his estranged wife of keeping him from visiting or calling their 6-year-old daughter and of "straying from an observant lifestyle," which he deemed "psychologically damaging to our daughter."

Robinson leaves to mourn a 14-year-old son in Philadelphia, an 11-year-old son, 8-year-old daughter in Virginia and his 6-year-old daughter in California.

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