Cops say Pinkus' slaying was an attempted marijuana robbery

Steven Bassett

Maliek Bailey

CENTENNIAL | Michael Pinkus and his girlfriend were watching a movie on the couch at his Aurora home Oct. 15 when Pinkus’ phone rang.

“OK, I’ll be right there,” Pinkus told the caller before quickly walking out the front door of his home on East Baltic Circle.

A few hours later, police found Pinkus dead at a nearby Crestwood Suites motel, his hands and feet bound, several ribs broken and bruises from his head to his legs. He had been strangled.

During a preliminary hearing last week for two of the three men charged with Pinkus’ murder — Maliek Bailey, 35, and Steven Wayne Bassett, 27 — investigators said Pinkus’ killers attacked him that night in an attempt to steal marijuana from him.

Later in the evening, Bassett and Bailey burglarized Pinkus’ home on Baltic Circle, looking for more marijuana.

Bassett, Bailey and a third man, Robert Lee Harper, 18, are charged with murder and several other crimes stemming from Pinkus’ death and the subsequent burglary. All three are being held without bond at the Arapahoe County Jail. Harper’s preliminary hearing is scheduled for Friday.

Bassett and Bailey’s preliminary hearing lasted more than three hours before Judge Gerald Rafferty continued it to Feb. 23. At that hearing, Judge Rafferty is expected to rule whether there is enough evidence for the pair to stand trial.

The hearing was the first time since Pinkus’ death that details about the case were released publicly. Court documents in the case have been sealed since police arrested Bassett that night near the hotel.

Aurora Police Detective RJ Wilson, the lead investigator on the case, testified that after his arrest, Bassett told police he was hanging out with the other two suspects and two women that night at the hotel room where the women lived.

Bassett told police that Bailey was Harper’s father and that he had worked with them at Bailey’s moving company a few times in previous weeks.

The night of Pinkus’ slaying, Bailey asked Bassett if he knew anybody who sold marijuana.

Bassett later called Pinkus, who he knew as “Bud Mik,” and who he said he had bought marijuana from in the past.

After they arranged for Pinkus to come to the hotel room, Bailey told Bassett he planned to rob Pinkus.

“I ain’t planning to pay this motherf----r,” Bailey said.

Bassett told police he hid in the hotel room’s bathroom and peaked out the window as Bailey and Harper attacked Pinkus.

Bassett told police he came out of the bathroom after he heard Pinkus stop struggling, but it wasn’t clear from Friday’s testimony if Pinkus died during the initial struggle or later.

As Wilson testified about what Bassett told police, Bailey, seated a few feet from Bassett, glanced occasionally at Bassett and slowly shook his head.

After the attack in the hotel room, Bassett and Bailey decided to go to Pinkus’ nearby home to steal the marijuana they believed he kept there. Harper stayed behind to watch Pinkus.

Pinkus’ girlfriend and his roommate testified they were at the home that night with Pinkus’ young son when a short time after Pinkus left Bassett came through the unlocked front door. He then opened the back door and a black man wearing black covering everything but his eyes entered the home. The witnesses called the outfit a “ninja suit.”

Bassett, who was carrying a garbage bag, as well as the other man, searched the home for a few minutes before leaving. Based on Friday’s testimony, it didn’t appear they found any drugs or any other valuables.

Bassett and the man in black later took the girlfriend and roommate’s cell phones, as well as the cordless phones in the house, apologized to the women for getting them “caught up in this” before fleeing over the back fence.

Police said they later found the phones nearby, as well as Pinkus’ credit cards and keys.

The charges against Bassett and Bailey include felony murder, burglary, robbery, larceny and kidnapping, according to Colorado Bureau of Investigation records.

Prosecutors filed four kidnapping charges against Bassett and Bailey, three of them are listed in CBI records as “kidnapping 2-victim sex offense/robbery” and the fourth as “kidnapping 2-seize/carry victim.” It wasn’t clear from testimony last week whether there was a sexual element to the crimes.