Youngstown man pleads guilty to lesser offense

YOUNGSTOWN -- The Hine Street man charged with murder in the city's first homicide of 2005 pleaded guilty to the lesser offense of involuntary manslaughter Friday in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.
Robert A. Parker, 25, entered his plea, which included a firearms specification, before Judge R. Scott Krichbaum for the Jan. 19 shooting death of Zymond Bellard, 17, of Magnolia Avenue.
In a separate case, Parker was also charged with attempted murder and felonious assault with a firearms specification from a Jan. 12 incident in which the victim was Jerome Morgan. Parker pleaded guilty Friday in that case to lesser charges of felonious assault with a firearms specification.
No information was immediately available about the Jan. 12 crime.
Police said Bellard was shot and killed inside Apt. 39 of 930 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. Mortally wounded, Bellard fired his own 40-caliber gun as two suspects fled.
Parker remains in the Mahoning County Jail and is awaiting sentencing, which has not been set.