Gas Station Homicide Defendant Wants Evidence Kept From Trial

The 21-year-old Waukesha man accused of gunning down a Petro Mart clerk during a robbery is claiming his arrest and evidence obtained by police during his arrest violates his constitutional rights.

Billy J. Ingram, who has been in custody since the day after Nayyer Rana, 56,was found dead May 29 at the gas station on East Broadway, is asking a judge to prohibit prosecutors from presenting evidence found in bags seized by police during his trial, according to a court motion filed last week.

Elm Grove police officers located bags that had Rana’s key lanyard and cell phone, as well as information linking the bags to Ingram. Ingram later admitted one of the bags was his when the Brookfield Police Department took him into custody on May 30 for a probation warrant, according to a criminal complaint.

Police later reported finding Ingram’s fingerprints on the gun used to shoot Rana at a close range. The gun also had the fingerprints of its owner, a cousin who allowed Ingram to live at his Jackson Court home, according to testimony given during a preliminary hearing against Ingram.

Rana was stopped by Brookfield police officers who were investigating a nearby burglary. Ingram’s attorneys are claiming Ingram did not match the burglary suspect’s description.

"(Police) detained the defendant without a warrant and without any reasonable suspicion of probable cause that the defendant had committed a crime," states the motion filed in Waukesha County Circuit Court. "The defendant was subjected to questioning and was required to identify himself. After being detained for an unreasonable period of time without cause, the defendant’s identity was established. Only then was it discovered that a warrant was in effect for the defendant’s arrest by virtue of a request by the Department of Community Corrections."

A two-hour hearing into the matter is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Nov. 20.

Ingram, who faces life in prison if convicted, remains jailed in lieu of  $1 million bail. He's charged with first-degree intentional homicide, armed robbery with the use of force, possession of a firearm by a felon and possession of marijuana.