Watson
KINGSTON – A 24-year-old Kingston man was sentenced in Ulster County
Court to 15 years in state prison on three separate felonies.
Kashawn Taffawe Watson was convicted after a jury trial on June 9 of one
count of robbery and two counts of criminal possession of a weapon.
Watson and a second person, wearing black ski masks and carrying a loaded
gun and an electric stun gun, entered a home on Albany Avenue in Kingston
on June 7, 2016, at about 4:45 a.m. demanded money.
Several residents were present at the time with Watson and the other person
threatening them at gunpoint, and then using nylon zip-ties, tied them
up and assaulted them.
During a struggle with one of the residents a shot was fired. The spend
round, which was found in the floor, was matched through ballistics testing
to a handgun found in an abandoned car on Downs Street, about two blocks
from the home invasion.
Also found in the car were two black ski masks, one of which contained
Watson’s DNA.
Shortly after the trial, Watson pled guilty to an unrelated case. That
plea to criminal sale of a controlled substance was as a result of a drug
sale in July of this year in the City of Kingston. Watson received a concurrent
sentence of three years plus two years of post-release supervision on
the drug conviction.
Watson moved to Ulster County from Poughkeepsie in 2005. He attended Kingston
High School until his junior year. He has been residentially placed through
family court, and has been placed on adult probation as a youthful offender.
Those convictions represent his first adult criminal convictions.
He also faces federal gun and drug sale charges after his arrest in October
2016 by federal authorities following the swept known as “Blood
Clot.”
The cases were investigated by Kingston Police Department’s Special
Investigations Unit and prosecuted by Senior Assistant District Attorney
Gerard Van Loan. Watson was represented by Edward Bruno of Pine Bush.
