Preliminary hearing delayed for suspect in Rostraver Township killing
Mike Jones/Observer-Reporter
Keven Van Lam, who is charged in connection with the Nov. 5 shooting death of Boyke Budiarachman in Rostraver Township, is escorted by a sheriff’s deputy from the Westmoreland County Courthouse in this December photo.
Mike Jones/Observer-Reporter
Keven Van Lam, who is charged in connection with the Nov. 5 shooting death of Boyke Budiarachman in Rostraver Township, is escorted by a sheriff’s deputy from the Westmoreland County Courthouse on Monday after asking a magistrate to delay his preliminary hearing in the case.
GREENSBURG – The suspect charged in connection with last month’s deadly shooting of a man outside a Rostraver Township shopping plaza made his first public appearance Monday since his arrest, but asked a magistrate for his preliminary hearing to be delayed at least 60 days.
Keven Van Lam was shackled and wearing a blue prison jumpsuit as sheriff’s deputies escorted him to his preliminary hearing on unknown charges before District Judge Wayne Vlasic at the Westmoreland County Courthouse in Greensburg.
Lam, 55, is charged in connection with Nov. 5 killing of Boyke Budiarachman, who was gunned down in the parking lot of Rostraver Square near Belle Vernon. No details have been released after the case was sealed following Lam’s arrest at a North Strabane Township residence two days after Budiarachman’s death.
No information was released during the brief proceeding in which an interpreter could be heard speaking Vietnamese over a cellphone translating to Lam what was said at the hearing. Lam did not speak, but he appeared to wipe tears from his eyes when he saw members of his family in the gallery. Relatives of Budiarachman, 49, of Rostraver Township, also attended the hearing and became emotional when Lam entered the courtroom.
Lam’s defense attorney, David Shrager, asked Vlasic for the preliminary hearing to be delayed 60 days after spending nearly an hour in a private room speaking to his client. Neither the charges against Lam nor his bond at the Westmoreland County jail were made public during the hearing.
The case has been shrouded in secrecy after the Westmoreland County district attorney’s office asked Judge Christopher Feliciani to seal the arrest warrant that was filed Nov. 6 against Lam.
Attorneys with the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press filed an emergency motion earlier this month on behalf of three newspapers, including the Observer-Reporter and Herald-Standard, asking for the case to be unsealed. Feliciani denied the motion following a hearing Wednesday, ruling that making public the details of the case could hamper the investigation. Attorneys for the nonprofit in Washington, D.C., said Monday that they were considering their options about appealing to the state Superior Court.
Investigators announced a few days after the shooting that they had arrested a suspect in the “targeted” killing of Budiarachman, but Lam was only identified as a suspect when a reporter went to the Westmoreland County Courthouse and asked to see the seal order for the case. The motive in the killing remains a mystery, although associates of the victim and suspect previously said the two men had business ties. It’s not known if there are other suspects arrested in connection with the killing.
A new preliminary hearing date has not yet been scheduled.