photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Cir Allen Glover is pictured Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024, in Douglas County District Court.

Updated at 6:10 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 2

A Douglas County judge has ordered a Lawrence teen to stand trial for first-degree, premeditated murder in the shooting death of a 17-year-old boy earlier this year.

The defendant, Cir Allen Keith Glover, 19, appeared in court Wednesday for the second part of his preliminary hearing on the original charge of second-degree murder in the death of Isaiah Neal. Glover is accused of gunning down Neal on June 13 outside of Neal’s apartment at 2406 Alabama St.

Judge Stacey Donovan found probable cause, however, for the more serious charge of first-degree, premeditated murder, after Deputy District Attorney David Greenwald’s closing argument Wednesday, in which he told the court that the evidence showed that Isaiah was shot in the back seven times with his own gun immediately after a visit from Glover, who then fled the scene with Isaiah’s firearm.

While Donovan heard testimony from Neal’s mother, Natasha Neal, and law enforcement personnel last week, as the Journal-World reported, on Wednesday she heard from an 18-year-old woman, who testified that Glover was her child’s nonbiological father, and from the lead detective on the case, Nathan Haig of the Lawrence Police Department.

The woman, Mariah Hall, took the stand in shackles because she was appearing not voluntarily but under a material witness warrant. She testified that she has known Glover her “whole life” and Isaiah since middle school.

She said that she and Isaiah had “got into it” in June over an incident in which she called Isaiah and his friends “broke” after a trip for fast food that she was presumed to be paying for. She said that Isaiah violently attacked her after the comment.

“He pistol-whipped me in the face,” she said she told Glover, “and it was over McDonald’s.”

She testified that she told Glover about the incident and that he had said he wasn’t going to do anything about it.

Hall showed reluctance to say much on the stand and was asked to refresh her memory about comments that she had made to police by reviewing a report about the incident. After some time spent reading, she testified that she told police that Glover had gone to Isaiah’s that night, but she said on the stand that she didn’t know much else.

Detective Haig, who said he was in Isaiah’s hospital room for a couple of hours with Isaiah’s mother that night, testified about Snapchat and surveillance camera footage that he said pointed to Glover.

He said that Neal told him about Glover’s visit.

Haig said he checked surveillance video from more than 100 locations and found evidence on a traffic camera at 635 W. 25th St., near the location of the shooting, that showed a man wearing all black running south, and from that he and other officers, using other footage, pieced together a path for the suspect.

One camera’s infrared footage showed discoloration on the handle of a firearm the man appeared to be carrying. Haig connected this discoloration to a rubber band on the handle of a gun that he had seen Isaiah posing with in a video. Isaiah had also spoken on SnapChat of having a Glock 43 handgun, Haig said.

He also testified that Isaiah’s gun was missing. A crime scene technician last week testified that she had found a baggie of dozens of bullets in Isaiah’s room but no gun.

Haig said that Neal told him at the hospital that Isaiah had a gun in his pocket when he left the house — to which Neal, from the courtroom gallery, said “lies” and “you’re setting my son up,” prompting a court recess.

Haig testified that he saw a Snapchat message from that night from Isaiah to Glover, in which he reportedly said, “Shit, how much for the 30-stick?” — a reference to purchasing a gun that could hold 30 rounds, Haig said.

Glover replied that he was going to “do one to gain his trust” — it wasn’t clear whom he was referring to — and then get the rest through a “100% discount,” which Haig understood to be a reference to robbery.

Isaiah then told him to “Hurry up, I’m going to give you 45,” Haig said, apparently referring to 45 minutes.

Haig said he did not see any threats or evidence of hostility between Glover and Isaiah in the Snapchats that he reviewed.

He testified that a KBI lab report indicated gunshot residue on Glover’s hands and face about 30 hours after the incident, but he said he couldn’t say whether the amount found was a lot or a little, and he also could not testify about DNA or fingerprints related to the incident.

In his closing argument, Greenwald said that a finding of probable cause for first-degree murder was warranted, among other reasons, because Isaiah was shot seven times in the back, apparently from some distance, which he said suggested premeditation rather than a heat-of-the-moment struggle. He said that Glover “fled the scene with Isaiah’s gun” after shooting him with it and that the whole evening had fit Glover’s “MO” of building trust and then getting the “100% discount,” or betraying that trust.

Greenwald did not offer a precise motive for the shooting, which Glover’s attorney, Michael Clarke, conceded wasn’t a necessary element of the crime, “but the motive would be the glue,” he argued to Donovan, insisting that the two teens “got together as friends that night” and that it was “pure speculation” that Isaiah was shot with his own gun and that Glover had anything to do with it.

In the first part of the preliminary hearing last week, Neal had recounted how Glover came to her home late that June night and visited with Isaiah, whom he had known since infancy. After a gun went off upstairs where the boys were, Neal told Glover to get out, which he did, but Isaiah also left the house shortly afterward and was gunned down outside.

Law enforcement personnel testified last week that Isaiah’s body was “riddled with bullet holes from head to toe” and that surveillance footage showed a man with facial hair in a hooded shirt walking in the vicinity “cradling” a handgun.