Man gets year in prison for retaliation after brother’s murder
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
A man who police say pistol whipped another man he thought was responsible for his brother’s slaying was sentenced to a year in prison.
Jawuan Brown, 20, on Monday told Judge R. Scott Krichbaum of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court he was sorry for his actions July 27 and that he allowed his anger to get the best of him. He said he hopes he can learn how to curb his anger while he is in prison.
“I know what I did was wrong,” Brown said. “I acted out of anger.”
On July 26, Brown’s 18-year-old brother, Jarrell Brown, was found shot to death at Market Street and West Indianola Avenue on the South Side.
The next day, Jawuan Brown went to the Princeton Avenue home of a man he thought was involved in his brother’s death and hit him in the face with a pistol, police said. The victim’s father then came out of the house with a shotgun and fired a round that wounded Jawuan Brown and his sister with buckshot. Witnesses told police Jawuan Brown also fired a shot, but police never found a gun.
“Just because there was no gun found there, I am not naive enough to believe there is no gun,” Judge Krichbaum said.
Besides the death of his brother, Jawuan Brown’s father also was slain in 2001, said his lawyer Ronald Knickerbocker.
Brown was sentenced on a charge of attempted felonious assault after plea negotiations between Knickerbocker and Assistant Prosecutor Natasha Natale. The pair also agreed on the sentence, which they recommended to the judge.
Judge Krichbaum said he agreed to the sentencing recommendation but that he was dismayed that Brown is another person he has seen too often in his court who try to take matters into their own hands instead of contacting the authorities. He sentenced a man Wednesday to two years in prison for a similar type of crime.
“People think they’re in charge of the world, and they go and get a gun,” Judge Krichbaum said. “They think this is a Clint Eastwood movie or something.” Two juveniles were taken into custody and charged with the death of Jarrell Brown. Police said the man Jawuan Brown confronted had nothing to do with Brown’s brother’s death.