A long road to justice
Accomplice to 2011 murder of Ditmas Park cafe owner gets 18 years
BY BEN VERDE
A man who acted as an
accomplice to a 2011 murder
in Ditmas Park will spend
18 years in prison, after a
federal judge sentenced the
27-year-old on Dec. 6.
Judge Jed Rakoff handed
down the 216-month punishment
to Michael Mazur for
acting as the lookout during
the murder of Joshua Rubin
on Oct. 31, 2011 — a case that
remained cold for years,
and shocked the neighborhood
where the victim was
a widley-known as a beloved
small business owner.
Mazur had pled guilty to
one count of Hobbs Act robbery,
which implicated him
in the murder.
According to prosecutors,
the Halloween-night
mayhem began when Mazur,
along with defendants
Gary Robles and Kevin Taylor,
plotted to rob Rubin
of a pound of marijuana,
which he had been selling
to help pay for his business,
the Whisk Bakery Cafe on
Newkirk Avenue.
The trio led Rubin to an
apartment under the guise
of purchasing weed, but,
once he arrived, Taylor and
Robles brandished a firearm
and demanded the victim
hand over the drugs.
When he refused, the pair
shot Rubin — while Mazur
waited outside as a getaway
driver, according to investigators.
The defendants then
drove out to rural Pennsylvania
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with Rubin’s body,
where they dumped him in
a garbage can and set him
on fire. Rubin’s body was so
disfigured that he was not
identified until December
of that year.
The case shocked Brooklyn
and remained cold for
years, until federal agents
arrested the three suspects
in 2020.
Both Taylor and Robles
are awaiting sentencing in
this case, according to prosecutors.
Mazur had over 200
pounds of marijuana in his
home at the time of his arrest,
making him ineligible
for bail, and therefore he had
been locked up while awaiting
trial and sentenceing.
“Michael Mazur participated
in the robbery that led
to the murder of Joshua Rubin,
and then he and his codefendants
put Rubin’s body
in the trunk of a car, drove
it to Pennsylvania, dumped
it in a garbage can, and
set it afire to cover up the
crime,” said United States
Attorney Damian Williams.
“Thanks to our law enforcement
partners and the Special
Agents of my Office, Mazur
will now serve a lengthy
prison sentence for his callous
crime.”
GONE TOO SOON: Joshua Rubin (above) was murdered during a robbery
gone wrong in 2011. File photo by Dan MacLeod
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