2 men charged in connection with September murder of Monroeville woman

Michael Divittorio | Tuesday, February 18, 2020 12:39 a.m.

Two men face homicide and other charges in connection with the September murder of a Monroeville woman in McKeesport, according to criminal complaints filed Monday.

Allegheny County Police charged Ramonta Yancey, 26, of Pittsburgh, and Daron Parks, 26, of Washington, with criminal homicide, robbery of a motor vehicle, conspiracy, tampering with physical evidence and abuse of a corpse in connection with 43-year-old Tameka Dallas’ death, the complaints said.

County police said in a news release that Parks was already being held in Washington County Jail and Yancey was lodged in Allegheny County Jail. Police said they issued arrest warrants for both men on the new charges.

Authorities discovered Dallas’ body shortly before 10 a.m. Sept. 12 in the woods near a trail at McKeesport’s Renziehausen Park, according to the complaints.

Dallas’ legs were bound together just above the ankles and blood was coming from her nose, the complaints said. Authorities pronounced her dead at the scene, and the Allegheny County Medical Examiner’s Office later ruled that she died of strangulation.

The complaints said video surveillance at the park’s dek hockey facility showed a silver 2007 Chevrolet Impala leaving the park just after 11:15 p.m. Sept. 11. Cellphone records later showed that Yancey was in the park at the same time, according to the complaints.

License plate readers in Allegheny County spotted the vehicle in Bridgeville, Heidelberg and North Versailles the next day, the complaints said.

Surveillance footage from one of the Walmarts, a store in North Versailles, showed Yancey and Parks exiting a vehicle matching Dallas’ car in the parking lot, the complaint said.

A witness also reported being picked up by Yancey and Parks in a silver Impala early Sept. 12 and taken to a gas station in Washington, where Yancey said he would rent out the vehicle for $100 a day, the complaints said.

The complaints also said that at least seven calls were made between Dallas’ and Yancey’s cellphones late Sept. 11, before the calls stopped at 10:55 p.m. and her phone stopped receiving a cellular signal.

The complaints said police later found clothing that matched what Parks had been seen wearing in surveillance footage from the Walmart store and gas station, and it had DNA matching both Parks and Dallas on it.