Man gets 13 years for role in deadly robbery
A Columbus man involved in a deadly armed robbery outside an East Side apartment building was sentenced Wednesday to 13 years in prison.
Charles Scott, 20, of the Far East Side, is among six defendants who have pleaded guilty in the May 8, 2015, incident in which they surrounded a man and woman walking from a convenience store to their apartment on Shore Boulevard East.
After the group took money and jewelry from James J. Johnson and his girlfriend, one of the robbers, Lawson P. Harris, shot Johnson, 18, in the face with an assault rifle.
An aggravated murder charge against Scott was reduced to involuntary manslaughter. He also faced an aggravated robbery count.
Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Laurel Beatty Blunt sentenced Scott to 10 years on each count to run at the same time. She added a mandatory three years in prison because a gun was used in the crime.
Harris, 18, was sentenced in December to life in prison with no chance of parole for 33 years. His sentence included time for two unrelated robberies. In one, a man was shot and wounded, and in the other, a woman was raped.
Prosecutors said in one case, Harris and some friends snuck up on a woman warming up her vehicle early the morning of April 30, 2015, causing her to scream for her boyfriend. The group brought the boyfriend outside and took the woman inside, where they sexually assaulted her. Then Harris and others robbed two men on May 2, 2015, shooting one in the chest. He survived.
For their roles in the May 8, 2015 incident, Keshawn J. Bowman Ross, 20, and Carl J. Brantford, 23, each were sentenced to 23 years in prison. Trevon M. McCreary, 19, was sentenced to 17 years.
A sixth defendant, Elijah Hand, 17, is scheduled for sentencing May 17. Hand and Harris were 16 at the time of the crime, but their cases were transferred to adult court.
The sentences were recommended by prosecuting and defense attorneys as part of plea agreements.
Bowman Ross pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter with a gun specification and aggravated robbery on Oct. 6, less than two days after testimony began in his trial on charges that included aggravated murder. Brantford and McCreary pleaded guilty to the same charges in August.