Woman convicted in murder, robbery

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The alleged triggerman in the slaying still awaits trial.

By PETER H. MILLIKEN

VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER

YOUNGSTOWN — After 10 hours of deliberations at the end of a weeklong trial, a Mahoning County Common Pleas Court jury found Andrea Kimble guilty Friday evening of complicity to murder and complicity to aggravated robbery in the shooting death of Matthew J. Saunders.

Saunders, 40, of Youngstown, was found shot in the head just before midnight Aug. 16, 2005, outside his car in a parking lot at Pyatt and Erie streets on the city's South Side. Police said Saunders had arranged to meet a prostitute in the parking lot.

The jury found Kimble innocent of complicity to aggravated murder, but guilty of the lesser offense of complicity to murder. Robert J. Andrews, assistant county prosecutor, said the jury would have had to find Saunders was purposely killed to have found her guilty of the complicity to aggravated murder charge.

Kimble, 22, of Green Acres Drive, faces 15 years to life in prison on the complicity to murder charge and three to 10 years on the complicity to aggravated robbery charge. She was also convicted on firearm specifications attached to each charge, which would add a mandatory three years to any sentence imposed.

Andrews told the eight-man, four-woman jury Kimble planned the robbery that resulted in Saunders' death.

Kimble cried and leaned on the defense table as she stood with her lawyer, John B. Juhasz, for the reading of the verdicts, and she sobbed as sheriff's deputies escorted her out of the courtroom.

Plea agreements

Two co-defendants, Laticia Alexander, 30, of East Warren Avenue, and Jawan Johnson, 25, of East Judson Avenue, who made plea agreements, testified for the prosecution during Kimble's trial before Judge Maureen A. Sweeney.

Alexander pleaded guilty in June to complicity to aggravated robbery, with the prosecution making no sentencing recommendation in exchange for her cooperation and testimony against her co-defendants. An aggravated murder charge against her was dropped.

Johnson pleaded guilty in January to aggravated robbery with a firearm specification. The aggravated murder charge against him was dropped in exchange for his cooperation with authorities. Judge Sweeney imposed on him the 13-year sentence the prosecution recommended.

Marcus Thomas, 20, of East Warren Avenue, who the prosecution said shot and killed Saunders, awaits his trial on an aggravated murder charge.

Testimony

Alexander testified that Kimble told her in advance that Alexander wouldn't have to perform as a prostitute, because Saunders, her would-be customer, was being set up for a robbery. Alexander testified that Kimble, who knew Saunders, had asked her if she would fulfill Saunders' request for sex for hire, and Alexander agreed to do so.

Alexander testified that Thomas and Johnson confronted her and Saunders while they were in Saunders' car, and Thomas, who had a gun, ordered her to run from the scene. As she ran away, she heard one shot, she testified.

Juhasz declined to comment on the verdicts.

Saturday, September 30, 2006