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Trumbull prosecutor wants Warren killer to stay behind bars longer
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins has again asked that Mitchell Monday, 45, be denied parole for killing Mark Dixon in 1995, and for setting Monday’s mattress and other items on fire in the Trumbull County jail while awaiting trial.
Monday was sentenced to 191/2 years to life in prison for murder, kidnapping, aggravated robbery, aggravated arson and being a felon in possession of a firearm. He has served 24 years and gets a parole hearing in September.
Dixon, who lived on Oak Street Southwest, went to Monday’s home for a party, but Monday later told police he killed Dixon by accident while playing with a gun.
“Then I pulled out a .38-caliber gun from my back pocket. I then pointed this gun at him and then brought it down,” Monday said. “I then started playing with the hammer, pulling it back and forth in which the gun [was] in front of my chest, and the gun went off.”
Watkins says, however, that Monday’s story makes no sense because Dixon died of a “contact wound,” meaning the gun barrel was touching or close to Dixon’s head. “It was point-blank,” Watkins told The Vindicator on Tuesday.
After shooting Dixon, Monday used ammonia to get rid of the blood. Monday was on probation and on electronically monitored house arrest on another case and could not leave his residence, Watkins said. Monday recruited others to take Dixon to a location on Salt Springs Road in Weatherfield Township, where his body was found, prosecutors said.
Watkins focused mostly on Monday’s bad prison record in the letter to the parole board, saying he was written up 36 times and found guilty of about 50 rule infractions between 2007 and 2019.
He recounted that in 2015, a corrections officer ordered Monday to leave the dining hall because “he was being disruptive and not eating chow. Inmate Monday refused and then stated, ‘Get the [deleted] out of here.’” While being escorted, he “became aggressive and began to pull away from the escorting officer and yelling, “I’m going to slap you [deleted] when I get out of the hole. I’m going to have you [deleted] up.”
Watkins said Monday “continues to defy authority and has no respect for others and is not making any effort to become a constructive member of society.”
“A man who is dangerous to others while in prison should never be unleashed on society to wreak havoc, especially a convicted murderer.”
He added, “This man should be turned down for parole for the maximum time provided by law – 10 years. At least in prison you can control the peril, harm and havoc he fosters.”