Published: Friday, October 10, 2014 @ 1:04 PM
Updated: Friday, October 10, 2014 @ 7:04 PM
Two security guards who killed a man two years ago as he attempted to leave an apartment complex agreed to plea deals Friday afternoon that will guarantee they spend at least three years in prison.
Justin Wissinger, 26, and Christopher Tarbert, 34, were working as private security guards for Ranger Security at the Summit Square Apartment complex the night of March 12, 2012 when they encountered Dante Price in the parking lot. The 25-year-old father was trespassed from the property, and the guards ordered Price from his car at gunpoint. When he did not comply with their orders and attempted to drive away, Tarbert and Wissinger fired 17 rounds into the car, hitting Price three times and killing him.
On Friday, the men each entered guilty pleas to counts of involuntary manslaughter at a hearing in Montgomery County Common Pleas County. They also agreed to plead guilty to an abduction charge. In exchange, the Montgomery County Prosecutor's Office dropped the murder charges the two faced, along with the weapons specifications that would have added an additional mandatory three years to their sentences. The men also waived their right to appeal as part the agreement.
The deal guarantees the two men will face between 3 to 11 years in prison — significantly less than if they'd been convicted of murder. The case was set to go to trial on Oct. 21. If convicted, Tarbert and Wissinger would have faced 15 years to life in prison. The agreement was reached after defense attorneys approached prosecutors. The prosecutor talked with Dayton police and Price's family before agreeing to the deal, officials said.
Price's mother, Saprena Riley, said for two years she prayed for a deal because she knew she wouldn't be able to bare hearing and seeing the details surrounding her son's death in open court.
"If you're not a mother who had (your) child murdered the way I had my child murdered, and what that would look like with that many bullets, to endure them having to show you, nobody would want to see that," she said. "I want to remember him as he was."
Riley and other family members wept as Judge Timothy O'Connell read the charges and accepted Tarbert and Wissinger's pleas. While the time in prison will be less than what they could have faced, Riley said at least she knows her son is guaranteed justice.
"Even though I laid my son to rest two years ago, today I actually laid my son to rest. He can rest. I'm just so grateful to God. He answered my prayers," she said.
At the time Wissinger and Tarbert were arrested, county Prosecutor Mat Heck Jr. said they had exceeded their legal authority trying to detain Price, and by using deadly force to try to make him comply. Heck and Dayton Police Chief Richard Biehl said Price's shooting was not a hate crime. Price was black. The two guards are white.
Ranger Security officials could not be reached for comments Friday, and Tarbert and Wissinger's attorneys reserved comment until sentencing.
The newspaper has reported that police reports show Tarbert had numerous encounters with Price in the six months before Price's death. Both Wissinger and Tarbert were permitted by the state Private Investigator Security Guard Services to carry handguns. Both had the required training.
According to state records, Wissinger had been with Preble County-based Ranger Security for several months prior to the shooting; Tarbert worked for the company off and on for several years.
Nine months before Price's shooting, the state moved to have the license for Ranger Security, owned by Ivan Burke, revoked because of thousands of violations. The company's attorney classified those violations as "clerical." The matter failed because the state did not follow all its procedures.
Published: Saturday, August 26, 2017 @ 6:16 PM
Updated: Saturday, August 26, 2017 @ 9:30 PM
An 18-year-old wanted in connection to an assault during a Charlottesville, Virginia, white supremacist event earlier this month is now behind bars in Cincinnati.
Daniel Patrick Borden, formerly a student at Mason High School, was arrested Friday and booked into the Hamilton County Justice Center, where he is being held for the Charlottesville Police Department.
RELATED: Group protests former Centerville residents’ Unite the Right rally participation
He is charged in Virginia with malicious wounding, Charlottesville police announced in a news release. The charges are connected to an Aug. 12 aggravated assault in the 500 block of East Market Street in Charlottesville, police said. He is not connected to a car attack of counter-protesters that led to one death and dozens of injuries.
Police on Aug. 15 named Borden a person of interest in a violent beating of a black man who was demonstrating against the Unite the Right g, Charlottesville police Sgt. Jake Via told our media partner, WCPO-TV in Cincinnati.
RELATED: 2 Antioch student counter-protesters witness Charlottesville car attack
Borden attended Mason High through his junior year, district spokeswoman Tracey Carson said.
Mason Police Chief Todd Carter said Borden no longer lives in the city, but that while a resident police had seven contacts with Borden. One was for allegedly making statements about a shooting at the high school and telling some classmates not to go to school that day, according to police reports about the incident, WCPO reported.
RELATED: State Democratic Party head: Ohio ‘epicenter of hate group activity’
Detectives are continuing the investigation into the vehicle attack that led to one death and injuries, some severe, to 35 people, police said.
Attack suspect James Alex Fields Jr., whose most recent address was in northwestern Ohio, is charged with second-degree murder, five counts of malicious wounding, three counts of aggravated malicious wounding and one count of felony hit and run.
Published: Saturday, August 26, 2017 @ 12:05 PM
A man was shot last night around 3:15 a.m, according to Dayton police.
The victim, identified as Mikeone Beasley, was outside on the porch of a Cambridge Avenue home when he observed an argument between a group of people standing about a hundred yards away. Beasley heard several gunshots, and immediately felt that he had been struck by a bullet in his right shoulder.
Beasley ran across the street to his home, waking his cousin and girlfriend. His cousin then drove him to Miami Valley Hospital.
Published: Saturday, August 26, 2017 @ 1:52 PM
A Florida man suspected of raping and beating a woman for hours at a resort in Islamorada on Thursday night also tried to set her on fire, the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office said.
The victim told deputies that Jorge Moreno, 34, checked into the Amara Cay Resort around 5 p.m. Thursday and attacked her when he asked for her cellphone and she refused, the Miami Herald reports.
Moreno allegedly threatened to kill the victim and her child, and also forced her into a bathroom, held a towel over her face and ran water over her “so she would feel like she was drowning,” the Herald reports.
The victim told deputies Moreno then doused her in tequila and said he would set her on fire, but fell asleep after he couldn’t find a lighter.
Moreno drove the woman to a bridge early Friday and again threatened to kill her by pushing her off, deputies said. He then dropped the victim off at her parents’ house in Cutler Bay and left to go back to Islamorada.
The victim alerted deputies, and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officers found Moreno in Plantation Key.
He remains in the Monroe County Jail without bail and faces charges of attempted murder, sexual battery and false imprisonment.
Published: Saturday, August 26, 2017 @ 12:25 PM
Dayton police are investigating a Salem Avenue home that was shot last night around 11 p.m., breaking a second-floor window.
The police responded to the call of a woman who stated she was in a front bedroom on the second floor when she heard the sound of glass breaking. She looked at the window to find a hole there and a bullet lying on the floor nearby, according to Dayton police.
Police observed that the front window appeared to have been struck by a bullet, and observed the bullet that the caller’s mother had picked up using a tissue.
Please confirm the information below before signing in.