Trial starts in ‘14 murder case
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
Jury selection was completed Monday afternoon in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court in a 2014 murder case.
Keith Sims, 27, of Ford Avenue, is on trial before Judge Maureen Sweeney on a charge of murder in the shooting death of Shaniece Wells, 23, of Maplewood Court.
Opening arguments in the case are expected to begin today.
Wells was shot to death about 11:25 p.m. Oct. 25, 2014, at a home in the 800 block of East Boston Avenue.
Investigators said the shooting stemmed from an argument Sims had earlier in the evening with another man. After the argument, Wells was among a group of women who came to the home to confront Sims because they were not happy with how the argument turned out. That is when Wells was shot.
The group was leaving when Wells was shot, investigators said. Investigators said they interviewed several witnesses who told them Sims was the person who fired the shot.
Wells was taken by car to St. Elizabeth Youngstown Boardman and later to St. Elizabeth Hospital Youngstown, where she died.
Sims surrendered to police two days later and has been in the Mahoning Couny jail since then.
Last week, attorneys tried to resolve the case with a plea bargain but Sims refused, even after his mother was brought in by his lawyers to try to talk to him.