Columbus man on trial for mistake that killed Carver football ‘beast.’ Here’s what happens next
A crucial error in handling a loaded gun led to one Columbus teenager’s fatally shooting another as they sat in a car with friends in 2017, according to testimony Wednesday in the involuntary manslaughter trial of Alex Antonio Wilson.
Wilson, now 21, is charged in the July 14, 2017, death of 18-year-old Richard Vaughn “R.J.” Cummings Jr. Cummings was shot in the back as he sat in the front passenger’s seat of Lorenza Davonta Madden’s Mercury Grand Marquis in the parking lot of Hannah Heights Apartments. He died later in the hospital.
In 2017, Wilson was 18 and Madden was 19. In the car with them was a fourth youth, Tyler Jones, who was 20.
Called to the witness stand Wednesday morning, Madden testified he had been to a basketball tournament that night at the Frank D. Chester Recreation Center on Benning Drive before he came home to the 909 Farr Road apartments, where he lived with his mother.
Planning to go to a party with his friends, he got cleaned up and waited outside in his car for them to arrive, and then they all got into his car. Madden said he was in the driver’s seat; Cummings sat next to him; Jones was sitting behind Madden; and Wilson was in the back seat behind Cummings.
Between the two front seats was a Taurus 9-millimeter semi-automatic pistol Madden said he’d bought from a man he met at a flea market. Cummings noticed the gun and asked to see it, Madden said.
Madden picked up the pistol and ejected the magazine, or clip, that holds bullets in the gun’s handle. Assuming he had unloaded the weapon, he handed it to Cummings, Madden said.
“He looked at it, and then he passed it back to Alex,” Madden said.
Wilson’s account of the shooting differed: He told police Madden handed the gun directly to him, not to Cummings.
Crucial error
What Madden did not realize, and did not check before handing over the gun, was that he previously had moved a bullet to the pistol’s firing chamber, so ejecting the clip had not unloaded it.
Wilson, who also didn’t check the chamber, pulled the trigger, and the pistol fired through the rear of Cummings’ seat, the bullet going through his back and into his chest.
Madden, Jones and Wilson jumped out of the car, and found Cummings so grievously wounded he could not speak, Madden testified. While Wilson called for an ambulance, Madden took the gun to his apartment and put it in a dresser drawer, he said.
They waited for the ambulance, but soon decided it was taking too long, and started toward the hospital in Madden’s car, Madden said. Then they saw emergency vehicles coming, went back to the apartments and flagged down a police officer, who directed the ambulance to them.
Police were called to the apartments at 11:11 p.m. Cummings was pronounced dead in the emergency room of Piedmont Columbus Regional at 11:36 p.m., according to the coroner’s office.
Madden initially told police Cummings was hit in a drive-by shooting, before admitting what actually happened.
In court Wednesday, Assistant District Attorney Mark Anthony asked Madden whether he checked the gun’s firing chamber before handing the weapon to Cummings.
“No sir,” he replied.
Anthony asked: Should you have checked it?
“Yes sir,” Madden said quietly.
Detectives questioned Wilson twice that night, then again the following July 17, and again on July 25, before charging him with involuntary manslaughter based on reckless conduct.
Police in 2017 also charged Madden with reckless conduct, but prosecutors did not pursue that.
No intention
The prosecution is not alleging Wilson deliberately shot Cummings: His indictment says he caused Cummings’ death “without any intention to do so.”
By basing the manslaughter charge on reckless conduct, they’re accusing him of endangering Cummings by “consciously disregarding a substantial and unjustifiable risk” in a manner that the law says “constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care which a reasonable person would exercise.”
Wilson’s attorney, Stacey Jackson, told jurors Wednesday that the shooting was purely an accident, as Wilson had no “reasonable belief” the gun was loaded, after Madden ejected the clip.
Jackson noted also that some semi-automatics have a safety feature that prevents their being fired when the clip is out.
Cummings and Wilson were close friends who played sports together at Carver High School, he said, adding that the two “loved each other,” and that Wilson broke down in tears upon hearing his friend had died. Cummings’ death was an “unfortunate and terrible accident” that Wilson now has to live with for the rest of his life, the attorney said.
Because Wilson has asserted the defense that the shooting was only an accident, the burden of proof shifts to the prosecution, to persuade jurors that what Wilson did was a crime, Jackson said.
According to previous Ledger-Enquirer reports, Cummings died just months after graduating from Carver, where he played linebacker on the football team. He was among 12 Carver players that year who signed letters of intent to play college football.
With dreams of one day playing in the NFL, he planned to attend Waldorf University in Forest City, Iowa, and major in business.
“He was a beast on the football field,” his older sibling Antoinette Luckett said in 2017. “He was one of the best to come out of Columbus, if you ask me, as far as the linebacker position.”
Wilson’s trial resumes Thursday in Superior Court Judge William Rumer’s Government Center courtroom.
This story was originally published October 24, 2019 at 5:00 AM.