Staff photo / Ed Runyan Ashaud Johnson, 19, was sentenced Wednesday to 31 years to life in prison in the Feb. 11 shooting death of Da’Mar McKinney, 17, of Youngstown, by firing about a dozen times with an automatic handgun into the parking lot of the Packard House Apartments in Warren. Johnson’s attorney is Jeff Goodman.

WARREN — Ashaud Johnson, 19, was sentenced Wednesday to 31 years to life in prison in the Feb. 11 shooting death of Da’Mar McKinney, 17, of Youngstown, by firing about a dozen times with an automatic handgun into the parking lot of the Packard House Apartments on Mahoning Avenue where he was living, hitting McKinney.

Johnson lived at the apartment but also had an address in Southington.

During Johnson’s sentencing hearing in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court, his attorney, Jeff Goodman, discussed a motion he filed Friday seeking a “presentence examination” of Johnson’s youth, intellectual capacity and critical thinking ability, which Goodman said Wednesday he asked for only several times in his career.

Goodman said he thinks those matters are “significant mitigating factors under Ohio law.” Judge Sarah Thomas Kovoor responded that she denied the motion, but did take into account Johnson’s youth and intellectual capacity, but she found no evidence “or no even discussion so far as to anything but a moderate intellectual capacity.”

Goodman clarified that he did not raise the issues of Johnson’s competency to stand trial or plead not guilty by reason of insanity. But he is raising the issue of Johnson’s intellectual capacity and critical thinking ability.

“I filed this motion because even though his youth, his intellectual capacity and critical thinking abilities are not germane to competency, they are widely recognized under Ohio law as critical mitigating factors,” Goodman said. He added that it only became relevant for him to mention this issue Friday after Johnson was found guilty the day before at trial.

Kovoor said she heard Johnson testify during the trial. “He was put under oath. He testified properly. He testified comprehensively, and I have taken into account his youth in my sentencing.”

Then she asked if Goodman had seen the criminal background check that was generated for Johnson, and Goodman said “Absolutely not.” Goodman looked it over briefly and said it is information the prosecutor’s office has access to, but he does not. And he has not had a chance to “make a determination as to how it might be relevant to the mitigation of my client’s position.”

Kovoor pointed out that Johnson has no felony criminal history, and Trumbull County Assistant Prosecutor Chris Becker said he agrees with that statement and noted that Johnson’s criminal record was made available to the defense earlier, as required under rules of evidence.

Goodman said he cannot say whether Becker’s statement is accurate, but he can see now that there was an inaccuracy in Becker’s sentencing memorandum regarding Johnson’s use of guns. Kovoor said she would strike the statement in Becker’s sentencing memorandum regarding Johnson having weapons.

And she said she also would strike the statement in the prosecutor memorandum suggesting that Johnson was smiling during the verdicts last week. “He was right in front of me. He was crying profusely. If there was a point where he was sitting at the defense table pouting his lips or smirking, I have no information that it was in any way connected to the verdict.”

She said what she is considering is that Johnson “is just of age as an adult, barely, and that you don’t have any felony record.”

Goodman urged Kovoor to sentence Johnson at the “lower end of the sentencing range, which is still an extremely heavy penalty that my client is going to pay. But it’s an extremely serious crime.”

Becker noted that he was not watching Johnson during the reading of the verdicts, but he was “relying on” the Tribune Chronicle article the next day that showed Johnson with what appeared to be a smile and a caption stating that.

As for the part of the sentencing memorandum regarding Johnson having guns, Becker said Johnson “freely admitted on the witness stand that he had a fully automatic gun that he took and toted around with him and is seen on the (surveillance) video.”

VICTIMS

Jenna Maze of the Trumbull County Victim Witness office read remarks to the judge by Arielle Brown, mother of the victim.

“I stand her consumed by pain I can barely put into words. I am angry, I am broken and I am lost. The loss of my son Da’Mar has shattered my world. My family is grieving, his brothers are adrift, heartbroken and lost. I have not eaten, and sleep is a distant memory.”

She said, “Each day I drift in a world with no return, struggling to imagine life without him. I cry, I withdraw, and I long for the nightmare to end. I feel consumed by anger and distrust, seeing everyone as a threat. My children are my entire world, and in one instant a piece of me was taken, something I can never get back.”

She said she wants to hate Johnson “for taking his life, but neither Da’Mar or God would allow it. So with that said, I forgive you.” Brown also added that Johnson showed no remorse.

That prompted Johnson to ask if he could speak, and Kovoor allowed it.

“I don’t know if the mother is aware, but I did write a letter to her,” Johnson said. “But I want to apologize to the mother for things that happened on Feb. 11.”

Kovoor gave Johnson 25 years to life for the aggravated murder conviction and six more years for using an automatic firearm. The sentences for two counts of tampering with evidence and receiving stolen property will be served at the same time as the aggravated murder and gun specification.

THE INCIDENT

Warren police said they found McKinney in the snow in the parking lot with an apparent gunshot wound at 11 p.m. Feb. 11. He was taken to the hospital, where he died the next day from his injuries. Johnson and Willis L. Smith IV, 18, were indicted Feb. 19 in the killing.

Johnson was convicted at trial of aggravated murder with prior calculation and design and firearm specifications. The receiving stolen property was related to the car Johnson used the night of the incident. The tampering charges related to the hiding of the gun and Johnson cutting off his dreadlocks after the shooting in an apparent attempt to avoid being identified.

Smith is indicted on aggravated murder with a firearm specification and tampering with evidence and is set for trial July 27. Among the surveillance videos from the apartment complex is one showing Johnson and Smith firing guns out of the glass door to the apartment into the parking lot.

A jury deliberated less than two hours June 11 before finding Johnson guilty on all counts and specifications.

The prosecution and defense showed jurors surveillance videos from the apartment complex for the first time during opening statements, with Goodman saying the incident involved a “gang from Youngstown” coming to the apartment complex to trade guns after communicating with a juvenile who was with Johnson and Smith.

There was an initial intention of meeting up a short distance down Mahoning Avenue from the apartments. But Becker’s sentencing memorandum states that “for various reasons the trade did not occur.” Johnson testified at trial that the reason was because there were Warren police officers near that other location.

The Youngstown group went to the apartment where Johnson, Smith and a juvenile were located, ending in gunfire.

Goodman said when the Youngstown group arrived in the parking lot, they were doing “full surveillance on the whole parking lot” and going in “with a combat-ambush posture.” He described four males having “triangulated on (Johnson’s) … door.” He said he believed that “the Youngstown gang started firing first.”

But Becker said in his opening statement that the videos show Johnson and Smith walking up stairs from the basement to “shoot at a group of individuals who were doing nothing but walking in that parking lot.”

Becker said Johnson and Smith “quietly opened a door from a basement apartment, and you will see from not just one camera angle, (you) will see from three or four different camera angles (Johnson) and his codefendant shoot at three or four individuals who are in the parking lot that had been driven up here from Youngstown.”

Becker said Johnson’s face, body and clothing are visible on the videos with his clothing having distinct characteristics, such as a Carhart jacket with a bleach stain on the back and black Adidas pants with a white stripe down the side and red and brown shoes that were recovered with a search warrant.

JOHNSON TESTIMONY

Johnson was the final witness in the trial. He admitted he was one of the two men in the video shooting out of the glass door toward the parking lot and agreed that he fired 12 shots.

Johnson said he also went to that same door about 2 1/2 minutes before the gunfire to look out into the parking lot. He said he did not see anyone and went back down the stairs to the apartment, which he had lived in with a woman for about a month.

Johnson said that when he returned to the glass door the second time, “As I was walking up the stairs, I heard gunshots go off. So me being scared, I felt it was necessary to fire my weapon to protect myself and my friend and my home.” The friend he was protecting was Smith. Johnson said he was not aiming at anyone.

When Becker cross examined Johnson about those details, Becker tried to cast doubt as to any of the Youngstown people firing first by showing the surveillance video and asking Johnson one by one what individual is seen firing a gun before Johnson fired his.

“Do you see any muzzle flashes, anyone shooting in the air?” Becker asked.

“No sir,” Johnson said.

Becker asked Johnson if anytime he hears gunshots he just starts shooting.

“From the reaction of my cousin, I thought he was under fire, so I protected him and myself,” Johnson said of firing the gun.

When Becker was asked after trial the reason he thought Johnson and Smith fired at the group from Youngstown, he said fortunately he did not have to prove motive.

“I really don’t know what the reasoning was. Obviously it wasn’t self defense,” Becker said. In Becker’s sentencing memorandum, he urged Kovoor to sentence Johnson to at least 36 years to life in prison.

There were a lot of deputies in the courthouse and outside for Wednesday’s sentencing hearing, but there were fewer people in attendance Wednesday than during the trial. Some arguing took place on High Street in front of the Courthouse among the people attending the trial after court let out on at least one of the days of the trial. The people attending the trial on behalf of the defendant and the victim were released separately.