YOUNGSTOWN Sentenced in murder, woman insists she's innocent

The defendant said she was confused by the verdict.
By BOB JACKSON
VINDICATOR COURTHOUSE REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Sabrina Bray insists she's not the person who shot and killed 29-year-old Alyson Buckner in an open field three years ago, although she's going to prison for the crime.
Judge Jack Durkin of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court sentenced Bray, 24, of Park Avenue to 18 years to life in prison Wednesday. A jury convicted her of complicity to murder Monday.
"I don't understand none of this at all," Buckner said just before the sentence was imposed. "I don't understand the guilty verdict. I don't understand complicity. I don't understand none of it."
Bray said she believed she was being tried only for acting as the principal offender, and did not realize she could be convicted of complicity.
Buckner's body was found by a passer-by in the field off Cloister Avenue on the city's East Side. She had been shot once in the chest.
What happened
During her trial, Daniel Carter testified that Bray killed Buckner over a long-unpaid debt for crack cocaine. Carter said he drove the car in which the two women rode to the murder scene, and that Bray was the one who pulled a gun and fired it at Buckner.
Bray's attorney, Dennis DiMartino, insisted throughout the trial that it was actually Carter who killed Buckner. Carter has not been charged with the killing.
Judge Durkin said he agrees with the jury, which decided that Bray was not the principal offender in the killing.
"But I do agree with the jury's verdict that you were in all likelihood there at the time the offense was committed," the judge said.
For that reason, she is guilty of complicity, and he had no choice but to impose the mandatory sentence of 15 years to life in prison for the murder and three years for using a gun.
"I'm not the one who killed that girl, but I was there," Bray said.
DiMartino said he intends to file an appeal.
bjackson@vindy.com