Driver in hit-skip fatal gets 8 years in prison

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

A city man, who pleaded guilty to aggravated vehicular homicide, failure to stop after an accident and tampering with evidence in a Feb. 2, 2013, hit-skip crash on Hylda Avenue, just west of Market Street, has been sentenced to eight years in prison.

Michael J. Johnson Jr., 25, of Rosewood Avenue got credit for 181 jail days he already has served awaiting disposition of his case.

He drew the sentence Tuesday from Judge James C. Evans of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court in the death of Robert Brown, 23, of Youngstown.

The judge fined Johnson $5,000 and suspended his driver’s license for 10 years.

Police investigators found only a piece of plastic from a car at the crash scene, but used multiple search warrants for cars, a sting operation and surveillance at a local business to find the car Johnson drove just before it was to be repaired.

As he walked to his car after leaving a bar, Brown was hit by a fast-moving car that did not stop, police reports said.