BATON ROUGE – A teenager and his father were both booked into jail less than two weeks apart from each other on separate murder charges related to two different cases.

Late Monday, Johntrell Banks, 17, was arrested on murder charges in the slaying of Tyler Batiste. Batiste was shot and killed after answering a knock at the door of his home in the 8400 block of Bayou Fountain Ave. in early February.

Banks shot Batiste on Feb. 9, deputies said. The deadly shooting happened just days before Banks’ father, Derrick Banks, was arrested in an unrelated murder case.

Banks was booked into jail on murder charges on Feb. 20 related to the 2018 killing of Antonio Sterling. Detectives believe Derrick Banks and his cousin, Kelvin Phillips, were the killers in Sterling’s death at a tire shop on Florida Street.

Sterling’s body was also set on fire. Arrest records obtained by WBRZ show the business was being rented by Phillips at the time of the killing and that an individual had tried to burn it down about 24 hours after the shooting in an attempt to destroy evidence. Investigators found traces of Sterling's blood inside the shop and used that to unravel the case.

Phillips was arrested for his alleged role in the murder and was previously jailed earlier in February after being accused in the killing of Lorenzo Dixon in 2017. Investigators say Dixon was gunned down as part of a plan involving three hitmen orchestrated by Martell Harris. Harris has previously been identified as a suspect in an extensive drug operation and having a hand in multiple Baton Rouge-area murders. 

The Banks duo, father and son murder suspects, are implicated in separate cases and investigators have not made any indication either crime is related.

Tuesday, the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff’s Office said while both are being housed in the same jail facility, they are not in the same area. Eventually, the younger Banks will be transferred to a separate facility because of his age.

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