Final member of trio charged in fatal Pittsburgh drug robbery heads to trial

Police say Sammie Lane Jr. executed Tayrod Ford in August 2022 during a drug robbery in Pittsburgh’s East End and then fled several hours later aboard a Greyhound bus.

It would take nearly three years for authorities to track Lane down.

They found him in March in a Lancaster County jail, where he was being held on unrelated charges.

On Friday, the homicide case against Lane, 37, headed to Allegheny County Common Pleas Court for trial after the defendant waived a preliminary hearing.

Investigators said Lane worked with two accomplices — Kevin Rivera and Sadie Watson — to steal ecstasy pills from Ford in a plot that turned fatal.

Rivera, 37, of Wilkinsburg and Watson, 29, address not known, are also charged with Ford’s death. They are scheduled for trial next month.

Lane’s lawyer, Patrick Nightingale, could not be reached for comment. Attorneys Matthew Capan, who represents Watson, did not return phone calls. Michael Machen, who represents Rivera, declined comment.

Police said three days before Ford’s slaying, the three defendants communicated over Facebook Messenger and Snapchat about plans to rob him.

Watson had saved a photo of the victim to her phone just minutes before joining the group, police said.

Lane and Rivera texted each other numerous times on the day of the shooting, according to a criminal complaint.

“We can get him in the am when I pull up,” police said Rivera texted.

Lane responded, “I want 4 myself,” the complaint said.

On Aug. 14, 2022, they waited for Ford at an apartment on Everton Street in Pittsburgh’s Lincoln-Lemington neighborhood, according to police.

Nineteen minutes before the shooting, police said Rivera texted one final time: “He otw now” — shorthand, the complaint said, for “on the way.”

Once Ford arrived around 6:25 p.m., Lane and Rivera attacked him, the complaint said. They stole counterfeit cash and “smackers,” or ecstasy pills, from Ford, according to investigators.

Police said Rivera told them he pushed Ford into a hallway to block him from entering the apartment. Rivera fired two shots, police said, striking Ford once in the shoulder.

Lane stood over Ford, who begged for his life, according to the complaint.

Ford asked the men not to hurt him and told them to take whatever they wanted, the complaint said.

Lane responded by shooting Ford once in the head, police said.

Rivera, gun still in hand, grabbed a book bag stuffed with marijuana and jumped through an open window, followed by Lane, the complaint said.

Rivera later stashed the money and the gun used in the shooting inside a hollowed-out speaker in his Wilkinsburg bedroom, police said.

Officers later found that 9 mm Smith and Wesson pistol, which had been reported stolen in Carnegie.

Pointing fingers

It was not clear how Ford and his alleged attackers knew each other. Court papers said Watson had been staying with Rivera while Lane temporarily stayed in Watson’s apartment on Everton Street. It could not be determined if that was the location of Ford’s slaying.

Residents told officers dispatched to 7184 Everton St. on the night of the shooting they heard an argument, followed by two or three gunshots.

Officers found Ford laying contorted in a stairwell. His blood had been spattered over six steps and was pooled around him.

Ford — who, witnesses said, went by the street name “Fresh” — was pronounced dead at the scene.

Just after midnight, police said, Lane fled to his native Harrisburg on a Greyhound bus.

Authorities recovered ballistics evidence indicating there were two shooters, the complaint said.

Police said they found three Samsung cellphones at the crime scene, the complaint said. They seized a fourth phone and a gun-care kit in a nearby apartment.

Investigators used fingerprints from that evidence, as well as cellphone data, license-plate readers and witness interviews, to piece together what happened that night, according to a criminal complaint.

Police said the fingerprints on the gun-care kit were Rivera’s.

Less than two weeks after the shooting, Watson called police to tell investigators Rivera and Lane, who went by “Junior,” shot Ford.

“Kevin Rivera and his friend Junior planned to rob the victim together,” she told detectives, according to a complaint. “And Junior wanted to kill someone.”

Both Rivera and Watson were in the Allegheny County Jail within weeks of the shooting. But Lane proved elusive.

Prison network

On March 3, 2025, more than two years since the first two arrests in the Ford murder, a pair of Pittsburgh detectives travelled to Lancaster County’s jail, the complaint said.

Lane was being held there on car theft, assault and other charges from a Dec. 31, 2023, incident.

A Pittsburgh police spokesperson said the yearslong lapse between Rivera’s and Watson’s arrests in August and September 2022, respectively, and Lane’s arrest in March occurred because a prosecutor at the time did not want to pursue charges. A new assistant district attorney then took another look at the case.

The Allegheny County District Attorney’s Office did not respond Monday to a phone call or email seeking comment.

After officers read Lane his Miranda warning and presented him with evidence, Lane told police “he wasn’t denying anything … but he needed time to speak with his family before making any statements,” the complaint said.

Lane was charged three days later with homicide, conspiracy to commit homicide, robbery and two firearms counts.

Lane had previously been imprisoned— for 18 months starting in 2010, and for 14 months in 2021 — in separate drug and burglary cases, according to state Department of Corrections records.

Rivera had served more than four years, from 2019 to 2023, on drug charges, state records show.

Rivera told detectives he met Lane through a mutual acquaintance who had been Lane’s cellmate, the complaint said.