Teen gets maximum murder penalty

Judge jails suspect 20-40 years

Intelligencer Journal
Lancaster New Era
Sep 29, 2010 22:08 EST
Lancaster

By JANET KELLEY, Staff Writer

A judge on Wednesday sentenced a Lancaster city man to 20 to 40 years in prison for third-degree murder, telling him, "life is not a video game."

Tyler Johns, 18, of Hebrank Street, was convicted by a jury in May of killing Kenyon Wright-Carter in January 2009 on Green Street.

As Johns stood for sentencing, Lancaster County Judge Margaret C. Miller said, "There is nothing I can do to change what you have done."

But, Miller continued, "If I could do anything, it would be to impress upon you and your generation that life is not a video game. There is no replay, no redo.

"When you take an action, it is real, it has consequences."

Miller imposed the maximum penalty, which was met with loud, anguished cries from Johns' family in the rear of the courtroom.

Before the sentence was imposed, Johns apologized to the victim's family members, who filled the first row of the spectator section of the courtroom.

"Forgive me for what I've done," Johns said, looking back at the spectators. "I really do apologize … and I hope God helps you with your struggle."

During the trial, defense attorneys suggested that Wright-Carter was a member of a violent Bloods gang and had beaten Johns and shot at him weeks before.

But there was no evidence of any shooting or prior problems, other than a fistfight, Assistant District Attorney Christopher Lechner told Miller — a fight that Johns lost.

If Johns was so afraid, Lechner added, "he should've called the police."

Lechner described the stabbing as "the act of a coward."

Prosecutors said Johns ambushed Wright-Carter on the afternoon of Jan. 24, 2009, knowing that the victim was unarmed.

That day, Wright-Carter was sitting in a car parked in the 500 block of Green Street when Johns approached.

The car door opened. Johns said he thought Wright-Carter was reaching for a gun.

The two young men started to struggle, the jury was told, and Wright-Carter was stabbed once in the chest.

Wright-Carter staggered to the porch of a nearby home, telling police his name and the name of his assailant before he died.

Johns fled, but turned himself in to police three days later.

Several members of the victim's family spoke during Wednesday's hearing, asking the judge to impose the maximum sentence.

Wright-Carter, 18, was not perfect, his mother said, but he had graduated from high school and was working full time and had aspirations of going to trade school.

He loved his family, they said, and was loved by them.

"No way I am ever going to forgive you," Wright-Carter's father told Johns.

The death of his only son, Kenneth Wright told Johns, "tore me apart."

The victim's parents both told Johns that they wished he would have come to them if he had a problem with their son, rather than resort to violence.

"You didn't have to do that," the victim's mother, Melissa Coleman, told Johns, "and he didn't deserve to die."

"I do forgive you," she added, "because I've got to go on."

Defense attorney Samuel Encarnacion described Johns as a "very bright individual" who had a difficult childhood, essentially left alone to raise himself.

Johns is a different person from the 16-year-old he met after the stabbing, Encarnacion said, and he'll be a different person when he gets out of prison.

Encarnacion said the defendant is in need of education, training and counseling to cope with the events in his life.

Johns' parents both spoke on behalf of their son and apologized to the victim's family.

"I wouldn't wish this on anybody," the defendant's mother said, weeping. "I just want to say I'm sorry. … Forgive my son."

From: http://articles.lancasteronline.com/local/4/295203