A defense attorney argued a teenage carjacking defendant’s arrest was not legal in a motions hearing before DC Superior Court Judge Errol Arthur on April 6.
Dylan Boney, 17, is charged with armed carjacking, robbery while armed, two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon, unauthorized use of a vehicle, and possession of a prohibited weapon for his alleged involvement in a carjacking on June 29, 2025 on the 2400 block of 14th Street, NW.
Boney is charged under Title 16, which allows prosecutors to try juveniles as adults for certain serious offenses.
The court arraigned Boney on the six charges and his defense attorney, Patrick Nowak, pleaded not guilty on his behalf and asserted his right to a speedy trial.
According to prosecutors, approximately fifteen minutes after police were flagged down to report the carjacking of a moped, Boney was found behind a wall in a parking garage and detained. They said the stolen moped was also found in the same garage. Prosecutors argued that he was “hiding” in the garage, while Nowak argued that he was homeless and sleeping.
Nowak argued a motion to suppress identification the defense filed on Nov. 14, 2025. They argued that the victim’s identification of Boney needed to be suppressed because he did not initially give any identifying features to the suspect besides “wearing all black and covering their face.” Then, when Boney was detained in the dark and from a distance, the victim said that [Boney] was the perpetrator.
Further, Nowak noted in court that in the body-worn camera footage the police officer accompanying the victim is heard yelling “we got someone,” which he argued could have unfairly skewed the victim’s identification.
Nowak also highlighted that a witness identified someone else as the suspect before Boney was detained. A phone with a lock screen picture of multiple men was left at the crime scene and the witness pointed to someone in the middle of the picture, telling officers that that man was the suspect. Boney was not the person identified or present in the photo at all.
Nowak in the motion argued, “because of the suggestivity of this alleged identification, the [victim’s] out-of-court identification and any subsequent in-court identifications by the [victim] must be suppressed.”
Prosecutors argued that there was no formal identification process for this case, “it was spontaneous,” and that the victim in the body-worn camera footage looked at Boney before he started pointing to him as the suspect.
Prosecutors also argued that the witness identifying the suspect on the phone did not negate the suspicion that police officers had when arresting Boney.
Judge Arthur did not rule on the suppression motion during the hearing but clarified that police responded to the stolen moped, not the witness phone identification.
Another defense motion filed on March 6 asked Judge Arthur to suppress GPS data and all other “fruits of the seizure,” obtained during Boney’s arrest. Nowak argued that the use of Boney’s GPS data after the arrest in this case goes against his constitutional rights, which protect against unreasonable search and seizures.
According to Nowak in the motion, “Boney did not voluntarily consent to the attachment of the GPS device to his leg,” and was not informed that the data would be shared with law enforcement or the United States Attorney’s Office (USAO).
Prosecutors disagreed and argued that GPS could be obtained by police officers at any time, and that the GPS device was visible on Boney in the body-worn camera footage. They argued that the GPS should be kept in as evidence because Boney consented to wearing it.
Prosecutors explained that Boney initially rejected the GPS, but he quickly accepted it after finding out his only other option was a youth group home. They also argued that in previous cases, similar situations have been upheld on appeal.
The motion to suppress all “fruits of the seizure” also includes the keys to the moped, which were found on the walkway up to where Boney was found. Nowak argued that the keys could have been dropped during the seizure.
Prosecutors refuted this, saying that where Boney was found had only one exit point and one entry point and that there is no evidence that the keys were dropped during his arrest. They argued that these were an abandoned item with no expectation to privacy.
Prosecutors argued that the location Boney and the moped were discovered, the time of day and the nearby offense were all “particularized facts that officers can consider,” making the seizure and evidence both legal.
Erica Arensman, Boney’s other attorney, told Judge Arthur that the only GPS data they received is a series of tables and maps, not the actual “raw data.”
Arensman reported that she and Nowak had “asked for the information multiple times,” and that they “still don’t have it.” She believes that they can’t have meaningful testimony without all of the information relayed to them from prosecutors.
Prosecutors said that this was the first time they had heard this and that they thought all of the information was provided. They asked Arensman for an example.
Arensman said that “[they’ve] been making this request for the raw data for quite some time,” and that there has been a lot of back and forth because “this is not something new.”
As a result of time constraints, parties are scheduled to reconvene on April 7 to continue arguments.
