Man, 27, convicted for role in slaying
A Franklin County jury rejected the testimony of a Far East Side man yesterday, convicting him of participating in the execution-style slaying of an 18-year-old woman and the wounding of her boyfriend.
Michael A. Jackson, 27, testified last week that he fled his basement bedroom at 5269 Carbondale Dr. before his brother shot and killed Dominae Gaston on Oct. 26, 2012.
Jurors apparently were more inclined to believe Gaston’s boyfriend, Dylan Stewart, who testified that Jackson held the couple captive with a shotgun while Gaston was murdered by Jackson’s brother.
Jackson was convicted of murder, felonious assault and two counts of kidnapping. Jurors also attached gun specifications to the murder and kidnapping convictions.
Murder carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison with no chance of parole for 15 years. The other convictions could delay Jackson’s chance of parole for up to 54 years.
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He is to be sentenced on July 11 by Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Tim Horton.
The jury acquitted Jackson of a more-serious charge of aggravated murder, which requires proof that the crime was committed with prior calculation and design.
Gaston’s mother, Joyce McGinnis, wept and embraced her husband, Ralph McGinnis, after the conviction.
Evidence established that Jackson’s brother, Modais Davis, shot Stewart, now 20, in the leg before forcing Gaston to kneel on a sheet of plastic and shooting her in the back of the head with a .380-caliber handgun.
Jackson admitted in testimony that he and Davis, 21, were angry with Stewart because they thought he had stolen from them.
Jackson testified that he had punched Stewart in the face, but he said he fled when Davis pulled a gun and shot Stewart. He insisted that Gaston was unharmed when he left.
Jackson testified that he had taken the shotgun from a wall rack, but only long enough to hide it in a basement closet.
Columbus police who responded to a 911 call from Stewart found Gaston’s body rolled up in a rug and tarp that had been secured with duct tape and hidden in a cluttered laundry room adjacent to where she was killed.
Three days later, Davis committed suicide with the gun used in the slaying when Columbus SWAT officers tried to arrest him at a North Side apartment.
None of the testimony explained why Davis killed Gaston, a 2012 graduate of Gahanna Lincoln High School who wasn’t involved in the dispute. Assistant Prosecutor Elizabeth Geraghty speculated in her closing argument that the brothers got back at Stewart by “taking his girlfriend.”
The jury deliberated for four hours on Friday and had recessed for the weekend, but one of the jurors failed to return to court yesterday morning.
Horton waited 90 minutes while court officials tried unsuccessfully to contact the 20-year-old man, who is on summer break from college. At 11 a.m., the judge appointed an alternate juror and instructed the panel to begin deliberations anew.
With the alternate in place, the jury deliberated for less than five hours before reaching its verdicts.
Jackson’s attorney, J. Tullis Rogers, said he couldn’t remember a case in his 45-year career in which a juror seemingly disappeared during deliberations.
Horton said his bailiff left the missing juror a voice mail instructing him to contact the court to explain his absence or risk having a warrant issued for his arrest. Until he speaks with the man or finds out what happened to him, the judge said, he won’t decide whether to impose sanctions.
Dispatch Reporter Theodore Decker contributed to this story.