Accused Teens’ Pasts Brought Out in Court : Investigation: Police say they know who pulled trigger, but won’t reveal which one shot James Jordan.

Daniel Andre Green, who was 15 when he tried to kill a classmate by taking an ax to his head, stared coolly ahead as a judge explained Monday that he was being charged with the murder of James Jordan, the father of basketball star Michael Jordan.

Co-defendant Larry Martin Demery, whose nine-page criminal record ranges from stealing Moon Pies to allegedly robbing a woman by beating her with a cinder block, began shaking and weeping uncontrollably when the judge, who was reading the charges against him, said the word “murder.”

The two slightly built 18-year-olds, who are charged with armed robbery, conspiracy to commit armed robbery and first-degree murder of James Jordan, answered only “Yes, sir” when Robeson County District Court Judge Gary Locklear asked them if they understood the charges.

Demery’s parents, who Sunday kept reporters away from their mobile home with warning blasts from a shotgun, sat crying in the crowded courtroom. Green’s mother hugged her son and kissed him on the cheek.

Then the two men, each of whom live in this rural corner of North Carolina, were led away in leg irons.

Green and Demery allegedly came upon Jordan, who was sleeping in his Lexus luxury sedan, between 2 and 3 a.m. on July 23. Jordan had pulled over to nap on a small utility road off U.S. Route 74 as he was driving from a friend’s home near Wilmington to his home in Union County, near Charlotte.

“He awakened, and when he awakened the guy with the gun got scared and shot him,” said Robeson County Sheriff Hubert Stone, who would not identify which of the two men police believe shot Jordan. The gun has not been recovered.

As Green was led into the courthouse, he responded to reporters’ questions by saying, “No, I didn’t shoot him. I didn’t kill him.”

Asked if he was involved, Demery replied “No,” the Charlotte Observer reported.

Robeson County District Atty. Richard Townsend said he has not decided whether to seek the death penalty against Green and Demery, who are being held without bond. They have not yet entered pleas.

Townsend said he expected to present their case to a grand jury next month.

In a related issue, officials said Jordan’s body would not have been cremated after three days had it been found a few yards away--on the North Carolina side of a creek instead of in McColl, S.C.

Unclaimed bodies are cremated in North Carolina, but only after a minimum of 10 days and an extensive effort to identify the person, an investigator for the state medical examiner’s office told the Associated Press.