An Anne Arundel Circuit Court jury convicted a 17-year-old Lansdowne youth of first-degree murder yesterday for shooting a rival suitor as the young man begged for his life.
The jury took just 50 minutes to convict Mark Anthony Wheelton in the slaying of Raymond Childress IV, 19, of the 1200 block of Montgomery Drive, Glen Burnie. Wheelton also was convicted of a handgun violation.
It was about 11 p.m. May 16 when Mr. Childress dropped off his NTC date after a night of church bingo. Kelly Parks, 18, of Glen Burnie had broken off her relationship with Wheelton about a month earlier, according to testimony during the three-day trial.
In a statement to police after his arrest, Wheelton said he approached Mr. Childress at Hammerlee Road and Sunset Drive in Glen Burnie and fired one shot from a friend's .25-caliber handgun.
Wheeltona resident of of the 3200 block of Gorham Court, could be sentenced to life without parole plus 20 years. Judge Martin A. Wolff is to sentence him Dec. 13.
Though Wheelton showed no emotion as the verdict was announced, the victim's mother, Melanie Thompson, seated a few feet behind him, put her head in her hands and quietly sobbed.
"Throughout this whole case he has shown no remorse whatsoever," said Raymond Childress III, the victim's father. "That's what bothers me."
Wheelton was charged the day after the murder. Christopher Suter, 21, a friend from Lansdowne who witnessed the shooting, reported it to police.
The 16-year-old who allegedly lent Wheelton the gun has also been charged with first-degree murder and will be tried in juvenile court next month.
Mr. Suter, who testified only after being granted limited immunity, has not been charged. Prosecutors would not comment on whether he might be charged in the case.
On the witness stand, Wheelton said county police Detective Keith Williams manipulated him into admitting the crime. Wheelton said that Mr. Suter was threatening Mr. Childress with the gun and that the gun went off accidentally as he tried to take it from Mr. Suter.
"All's I remember is I touched Chris' wrist, and it sounded like a firecracker," said Wheelton, an unemployed high school dropout.
Dressed in blue jeans and a blue sweat shirt, he answered his lawyer's questions in a fast-paced monotone, avoided eye contact with jurors and twice had to be told to sit up in the witness chair so the microphone could pick up his barely audible voice.
"Maybe he is not the kind of person any one of us would wish to call his son," his lawyer, assistant public defender James McCarthy, told the jurors in his closing argument.
But Mr. McCarthy argued that it was reasonable to believe Mr. Suter, who was older and bigger than Wheelton, "took over" the situation when the two stopped the victim in his Geo Metro the night of the killing.
"[Mr. Suter's] the big man. He gets these kids beer," Mr. McCarthy said.
Assistant State's Attorney William C. Mulford II emphasized that hours before being arrested, Wheelton admitted the shooting to a friend.