Heading to trial: Layne faces life in prison for murder

Sandra Maxine Layne, the 74-year-old West Bloomfield Township grandmother accused of murdering her 17-year-old grandson, will stand trial for Jonathan Archer Hoffman’s shooting death.

Layne was bound over on Monday, July 2 following a preliminary exam in 48th District Court. Layne appeared in Judge Kimberly Small’s courtroom on charges that she shot Hoffman multiple times around 5:27 p.m. on May 18, resulting in his death shortly after 6 p.m. that day.

Layne faces a charge of open murder, punishable by up to life in prison, and is also charged with possession of a firearm in the commission of a felony, which carries a maximum of two years in prison upon conviction.

Officials with the Oakland County Medical Examiner’s Office and the 48th District Court said they could not comment for this report.

Hoffman was a Farmington Central High School senior who had attended North Farmington High School in the past.

The 911 call Hoffman made to an emergency dispatcher on the day of the shooting starts with him saying, “I’ve just been shot. My grandma shot me. I’m going to die. Help.”

The dispatcher told Hoffman to stay on the phone. He said that he had been shot in his arm and his chest. He followed the dispatcher’s order to sit as he repeatedly said “Help me, help,” while the dispatcher told him to keep breathing.

A period of silence followed with the dispatcher repeatedly asking if Hoffman was still there.

A couple minutes later, the teen could be heard screaming in the background following a slight pop. Hoffman then said to the dispatcher, “Help me. I got shot again, my stomach, please help.”

That was the last time Hoffman’s voice was heard in the call. Later, an unidentified woman was heard screaming in the background saying “Let go,” before saying “Let me get you some water.”

West Bloomfield police officers responded to the shooting scene, the family’s condominium on Brookview Lane near Maple and Halstead roads. A handgun found at the scene.

Police reported that there was no one else in the residence at the time of the shooting.

The victim’s grandfather was not at the home at the time of the shooting, Diamond said. The grandfather was interviewed, and police state they believe he was “someplace else” at the time of the shooting.

Lieutenant Tim Diamond of the West Bloomfield Police Department has said that there was an incident in March at the family’s residence that required police intervention. He characterized the incident as “a typical family-type argument.”

Mitch Ribitwer, an attorney from Ribitwer & Sabbota, the firm defending Layne, previously said that Layne was required to call the police to the family’s condominium because Hoffman was out of control and that he was “belligerent to police, his grandmother, and his mother, and it took awhile to calm things down.”

Hoffman’s parents live in Arizona, according to Diamond.