Man pleads guilty to fatal drive-by shooting of girl

staff report

YOUNGSTOWN — A 19-year-old Dorothy Avenue man pleaded guilty Monday in the fatal drive-by shooting of a 3-year-old girl on the city’s East Side.

On the day jury selection was to begin for his trial, Stoney Williams pleaded guilty to aggravated murder with a gun specification and to improperly discharging a firearm at or into a habitation as he appeared before Judge Maureen A. Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

Williams was charged in the fatal shooting of Cherish M. Moreland, of Hilton Avenue, on May 5, 2007, from a car on Stewart Avenue.

The prosecution and defense agreed to recommend a life sentence with parole eligibility after 20 years on the aggravated-murder charge, plus five consecutive years for the motor vehicle gun specification and three consecutive years for discharging a gun at or into a habitation, meaning Williams would be eligible for parole after 28 years.

Had Williams been convicted in a trial, he could have faced life in prison without parole, said Williams’ lawyer, Thomas E. Zena.

The case was prosecuted by Robert J. Andrews and Jennifer M. Paris, assistant county prosecutors. Sentencing is set for 9 a.m. May 1.

On Jan. 15, Judge Sweeney sentenced a co-defendant, Damon K. Clark, 23, of Dogwood Lane, the driver of the car from which the fatal shot was fired, to 25 years to life in prison. A jury convicted Clark of complicity to murder with a gun specification and of complicity to discharging a firearm at or into a habitation.

Clark and two of his friends were asked to leave a Stewart Avenue house because they were drunk, police reports said. A few minutes later, Clark returned to Stewart Avenue at 11:08 p.m., driving the car from which Williams fired twice at a group of people standing outside, striking Cherish once in the head, police reports said.

The prosecution alleged Clark recruited Williams to be the gunman.

Williams is a son of Willie “Flip” Williams, who was executed in October 2005 for the 1991 shooting deaths of four men in Youngstown.