Photo Gallery | Defendant throws Molotov cocktail at 16-year-old witness' car

Lexington County Sheriff’s Department detectives arrested a trio in connection with the investigation of a motor vehicle that was intentionally set on fire outside the home of a 16-year-old boy who will be a prosecution witness in the 42-year-old man’s criminal trial.

Deputies arrested 42-year-old Robert Fletcher Herbert of West Columbia, the man’s 39-year-old live-in girlfriend, Lashanda Elaine Ball, and the girlfriend’s 19-year-old son, Deandre Ball.

Deputies say Herbert is awaiting trial on charges that he used a stolen pickup truck to break open the rear door at a gun business on March 29 on Emanuel Church Road near West Columbia. Herbert stole eight handguns worth about $4,220 from the gun business.

On Saturday, July 14, deputies arrested Herbert on arrest warrants on charges of third-degree arson, intentionally detonating a destructive device and intimidating a witness in a criminal court case, the report stated.

Herbert was being held on Tuesday, July 17 at the Lexington County Detention Center on bail totaling more than $1 million.

On Thursday, July 12, detectives arrested Deandre Ball on arrest warrants on charges of third-degree arson, conspiring to execute a bomb threat and intimidating a witness in a criminal court case, the report stated. Deandre was being held on Tuesday at the county Detention Center on bail totaling $40,000.

On Thursday, July 12, deputies arrested Lashanda Ball on an arrest warrant on a charge of intimidating a witness in a criminal court case, the report stated.

Lashanda was released from the county Detention Center on Friday, July 13 after she posted a $10,000 bond.

Arrest warrants allege that at about 3 a.m. on Thursday, July 12 Herbert and Deandre Ball used a destructive device, commonly referred to as a Molotov cocktail, to set fire to a motor vehicle that was parked outside a home in a residential neighborhood near West Columbia, deputies say.

The 16-year-old boy, who will be a prosecution witness in Herbert’s criminal trial on charges connected to the burglary at the gun business, lives at the home where the vehicle was set on fire.

Arrest warrants further allege that Herbert, Deandre Ball and Lashanda Ball previously made threats to physically harm the 16-year-old boy and otherwise retaliate against the boy for providing information to detectives that helped detectives develop sufficient probable cause to obtain arrest warrants for Herbert in connection with the burglary at the gun business, according to deputies.

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