Columbus man accused of stabbing his family to death gets prison, but not for murder
The Columbus man accused of fatally stabbing his girlfriend and their three young children is headed to prison.
But not for murder.
Travane Brandon Jackson was sentenced Tuesday on a probation violation stemming from his arrest on drug charges in 2013.
He’s accused in the shocking July 17 homicides that took the lives of 29-year-old Jerrica Spellman and her children King Jackson, 2; Kensley Jackson, 1; and Kristen Jackson, who was only a month old.
Jackson, 27, who’s known by his middle name Brandon, faces four murder charges, but Tuesday he was brought before Superior Court Judge Arthur Smith III after being sentenced to seven years’ probation in 2014, when he pleaded guilty on his drug charges.
Prosecutors persuaded Smith to revoke Jackson’s probation and resentence him to the maximum 10 years in prison he could have faced. That way Jackson will be transferred from the Muscogee County Jail to a state prison while he awaits trial for murder.
To avoid having to present evidence from the homicides to prove Jackson violated his probation, Assistant District Attorney Don Kelly instead chose a 2018 incident in which Jackson was arrested for simple assault, for injuring Spellman during a domestic dispute.
That was on May 17, 2018, when Spellman called police around 7 p.m. to a mobile home at Lot 41-B, 527 Farr Road, where she and Jackson had a fight.
Officer Savimbi Thomas was among those responding, and testified Tuesday to what he witnessed that night: He said he noticed Spellman had blood on her left cheek; her nose appeared to be bruised; and Jackson had blood on his hand.
Thomas said he had Jackson sit in the patrol car while he questioned Spellman. “In talking to her, she seemed very apprehensive, almost fearful,” the officer said.
He asked Jackson what happened. “He stated that she fell in the house,” Thomas said, but Jackson eventually admitted he pushed Spellman, and her face hit a table. Spellman gave officers the same account.
Thomas arrested Jackson for simple assault involving family violence.
Because it was Jackson’s first family violence offense, it was designated for “deferred adjudication,” meaning his prosecution was delayed while he took five weeks of anger management classes, which he completed this past January, prosecutors said.
The case still was pending in Muscogee State Court when Spellman and her children were killed. Because prosecutors no longer had a victim, at that point, it was dropped. .
With that offense as evidence of Jackson’s violating probation, Smith had to consider the 2014 drug charges for which Jackson had been sentenced to probation.
‘First offender’
He was charged with felony possession of marijuana with the intent to distribute it, and the misdemeanors of possessing a drug-related object, stopping in the street, and driving with unsafe tires.
Police said he aroused suspicion on June 22, 2013, when he blocked traffic by stopping a 1997 Chevy Tahoe on 12th Avenue about 3:30 a.m. He was caught with a digital scale, a large bag of marijuana and several small bags, officers said.
The case was resolved through a negotiated plea on May 12, 2014, when Judge Smith sentenced Jackson to serve a year in jail and seven years on probation.
Jackson was sentenced then as a “first offender,” whose record would have been cleared had he successfully completed probation. A first offender who violates probation can be arrested and resentenced to the maximum time in prison the law allowed for his initial offense.
Possessing marijuana with intent to distribute carries a maximum 10-year sentence.
While weighing Jackson’s 2018 family violence offense, Smith asked why Kelly didn’t have the victim in court to testify.
“She is dead and he is charged with her murder,” the prosecutor replied.
Smith sentenced Jackson to the full 10 years, but noted Jackson still gets credit for time already served on probation. How much credit he gets has to be calculated by the Georgia Department of Corrections.
Before the homicides, Jackson’s probation was scheduled to end Oct. 8, 2020. Kelly said he expects that with this new sentence, Jackson can be held in prison at least until Oct. 8, 2023.
But he’ll likely be tried for murder before then. Kelly said authorities still are waiting for the state crime lab to complete DNA and other testing, and the case has yet to go before a grand jury for indictment, but he expects the trial could be scheduled some time next summer.
Off to prison
Meanwhile Jackson will wait in prison, so the county jail won’t have to house him and ensure his safety.
“I wish they would do that more often,” said Sheriff Donna Tompkins, who’s in charge of the jail, which for the first time in years has an inmate population of under 1,000 because so many have been transferred to state prisons. It has a capacity of 1,069.
It costs local taxpayers $45 a day to house a jail inmate. Those charged in “high-profile” crimes, like Jackson, require extra attention, because they typically are housed separately from the general population.
“Someone like that is always a security concern,” Tompkins said, because other inmates hearing of the allegations may feel moved to violence.
“Then we may have a crime committed in the facility,” the sheriff said.
Jackson stands accused of repeatedly stabbing Spellman and the three children in their apartment at Elizabeth Canty Homes, a public housing complex off Cusseta Road near 20th Avenue, where patrol officers found the bodies after relatives requested a “welfare check” on the family at 8:44 p.m. July 17.
Though Jackson pleaded not guilty to the charges during his July 26 preliminary hearing in Columbus Recorder’s Court, he wrote letters to Spellman’s family admitting he stabbed her and the children, and apologizing.
Spellman’s brother James Freeman was among those who got one of the letters. He and wife Natasha, who frequently looked after Spellman’s 2-year-old son, were at Tuesday’s Superior Court hearing.
They said Spellman had four other children, ages 11, 9, 7 and 6. The 6-year-old’s birthday was Monday, when the little girl asked whether her mother would come back to curl her hair for her again, the way she always used to, they said.
Just before her death, Spellman had been planning to leave Jackson, said her brother, who believes Jackson could not bear her leaving and taking their kids.
This story was originally published December 3, 2019 at 5:25 PM.