Home-invasion killing brings life term
LOGAN — Stacey Stevens comes away from the heartbreaking shooting death of her father during a home-invasion robbery in rural Hocking County with a message.
“It’s a clarion call to people in Hocking County: If you choose to take someone’s life, you are not going to see the light of day,” she said Tuesday.
Stevens discussed how she was feeling minutes after Hocking County Common Pleas Judge John T. Wallace sentenced Joshua M. Conrad to life in prison without possibility of parole for the aggravated murder of her father, Gary G. Stevens, who was killed during a homeinvasion robbery around 4 a.m. on Sept. 1, 2016.
“I am happy with the result,” Stevens said of the sentence. However, the 41-year-old Grove City resident and South-Western City Schools teacher noted: “Nothing is going to bring my dad back.”
The 60-year-old homeowner was shot twice in the chest and died on the kitchen floor of his home. His beloved Yorkies, Donald and Sarge, were still at his side when deputies arrived.
A jury convicted Conrad on Jan. 31 of two counts of aggravated murder and two counts of murder, aggravated robbery, aggravated burglary, grand theft and having weapons under disability. The other convictions were merged with the aggravatedmurder convictions at sentencing.
Earlier in January, a jury acquitted Joshua Cross, who was with Conrad on the morning of the robbery, of all charges related to the homeowner’s death.
Conrad, 36, formerly of Amanda in Fairfield County, is already serving prison time, sentenced for a Pickaway County conviction. He appeared in court Tuesday in a wheelchair; he has a bullet fragment in his head from Stevens returning fire during the home invasion.
Deputies responding to a 911 call found Conrad lying in the driveway of Stevens’ home in the 16000 block of Pleasant Ridge Road near Laurelville before they found the body of Stevens in the kitchen.
Authorities said Conrad entered the home to rob it, shot Stevens and was shot in the head by Stevens.
Conrad admitted to deputies what had happened, and his DNA was found on the gun used to kill Stevens. In court on Tuesday, however, Conrad maintained his innocence.
“I am, with all my heart, truly sorry,” he told Stacey Stevens and the throng of the victim’s other relatives and family friends who packed the courtroom. “I wasn’t the one. I am being convicted of a murder that I didn’t do. This court is sending the wrong one away.”
Everyone who loved Gary Stevens shared his life story on Tuesday. He proudly served in the Marines and later became a certified pilot, was married and divorced twice, and raised Stacey, his only child, to be a girl who climbed trees and rode a motorcycle. She was, as she put it, “a full-on tomboy.” Her father had a knack for building and anything mechanical.
Stevens had built his dream house on a secluded hilltop. Inside that house, he bled out and died on the kitchen floor in front of the sliding-glass door from which he used to watch the deer and hummingbirds outside.
“My dad was worth a million dollars,” Stacey Stevens said, “and I wish we were discussing the death penalty today, not just life without parole.”