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Man acquitted in 2007 murder
The video was key in the verdict, the jury foreman said.
YOUNGSTOWN — A pizza shop security video was decisive in a jury’s verdict of acquittal for Dion D. Weatherspoon in the shooting death of William Burr, the jury foreman said after the trial.
“We felt very strongly — not guilty,” said James Dorman of Boardman, foreman of the jury of seven women and five men.
After 21‚Ñ2 hours of deliberations, the jury acquitted Weatherspoon on Thursday afternoon of aggravated murder and the lesser included charge of murder in the July 8, 2007, shooting outside Angelo’s Pizza Shop, 3215 South Ave.
The trial began Monday afternoon before Judge Maureen A. Sweeney of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.
The video shows Weatherspoon entering the pizzeria, asking for food, being told the shop was closed, and leaving the store right before six shots can clearly be heard on the tape. However, the video, which was played during the trial, doesn’t show anyone firing a gun.
The jurors determined from the video that Weatherspoon was too far from Burr’s car to have shot Burr six times through its partially open driver’s side door window without shattering that window or putting bullet holes in the car, Dorman said.
Jurors concluded that whoever shot Burr all over his body without damaging the car had to have fired at close range through the open window, Dorman explained.
“We started doing timings as far as how long shots took to occur and where the defendant was supposed to have stood,” while reviewing the tape repeatedly during deliberations, Dorman said. “We felt that he was too far away from the vehicle to have shot and then had shell casings fall in the car. The video was the key to the defense.”
“Everybody was convinced that they did the right thing,” he added, referring to the jurors.
The prosecution’s burden was to prove Weatherspoon guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, Dorman noted.
Burr, 27, of East Midlothian Boulevard, Struthers, bled to death from a bullet wound to his chest, which perforated both lungs. He also suffered nonfatal bullet wounds to his hip, forearms and upper back, according to testimony from Dr. Robert Belding, the former deputy county coroner, who performed the autopsy.
Testifying in his defense, Weatherspoon, 20, of Hilton Avenue, admitted entering and leaving the pizza shop, but said that he wasn’t carrying a gun that day and that he ran when another man began shooting Burr.
Weatherspoon’s lawyer, Tom Zena, credited the jury for its intelligence and thoroughness and said he believes his client could have been convicted if it hadn’t been for the store video.
“The video that the state attempted to use to convict him actually helped this jury right along the way of finding him not guilty,” Zena said.
A member of Burr’s family sobbed at length after the verdict was read. Robert J. Andrews, assistant county prosecutor, declined to comment on the verdict.