John Drummond was sentenced to death by the State of Ohio for a drive by shooting that left a baby dead. According to court documents John Drummond would open fire during a drive by shooting that would leave a three month old baby dead. John Drummond was arrested, convicted and sentenced to death.
John Drummond 2021 Information
Number A462868
DOB07/18/1977
Gender Male Race Black
Admission Date 03/19/2004
Institution Chillicothe Correctional Institution
Status INCARCERATED
John Drummond More News
The state presented several witnesses who testified at Drummond’s trial that Drummond and Brett Schroeder were members of the Lincoln Knolls Crips gang and considered themselves “original gangsters,” or “OGs.” Schroeder died from gunshot wounds in May 1998 in a death ruled a homicide. The perpetrator was convicted and is serving time in prison.
{¶ 6} The Dent family, Jiyen Dent Sr., Latoya Butler, his girlfriend, and their son, Jiyen Dent Jr., had moved into a home at 74 Rutledge Drive in Youngstown around March 20, 1998. Dent did not know Drummond, Gilliam, or Schroeder.
{¶ 7} In the early evening of the shooting, a few days after Dent moved in, ten to 20 people gathered for a party outside the home of Gail Miller on Duncan Avenue in Youngstown to drink and listen to music. Sometime that evening, Drummond and Gilliam arrived.
{¶ 8} During the party, James “Cricket” Rozenblad overheard Drummond, Gilliam, and Andre Bryant talking about a “guy moving in in [their] neighborhood [who] could have had something to do with the death of Brett Schroeder.” Yaraldean Thomas also saw Drummond and Gilliam whispering to one another and heard Drummond say “It’s on” after they finished talking.
{¶ 9} Drummond left the party and returned a short time later with an assault rifle. He and Gilliam then got into Gilliam’s burgundy Chevrolet Monte Carlo and drove down Duncan Lane toward Rutledge Drive. Approximately five to 15 minutes later, 11 shots were fired from an assault rifle into the Dent home. Within a few seconds, a 9 mm round was fired into the Dent home, and five 9 mm rounds were fired into the home of Diane Patrick, the Dents’ next-door neighbor, who lived at 76 Rutledge Drive.
{¶ 10} At around 11:25 p.m. that evening, Dent was in the living room watching a movie, Butler was in the kitchen, and Jiyen was in a baby swing in the living room. While watching TV, Dent heard gunshots and saw “bullets start coming through the windows and the walls.” He then picked up the baby and ran down the hallway towards the bathroom. Dent fell in the hallway and noticed that Jiyen had been shot in the head. After making sure that his girlfriend was safe, Dent called 911.
{¶ 11} That same night, Rebecca Perez, who lived nearby on Rutledge Drive, heard two series of shots when taking her trash outside. She saw shots coming from the corner of Duncan Lane and Rutledge Drive and noticed “a shadow up the street.” Shortly thereafter, Perez saw a maroon car pull out of the driveway next to 65 Rutledge Drive, where Drummond lived. The car then drove without any headlights on past the Perez home. Approximately half an hour to 45 minutes later, Perez noticed that the maroon car had returned to the driveway next to Drummond’s home. At trial, Perez identified Gilliam’s Monte Carlo as the car she had seen that night.
{¶ 12} Leonard Schroeder, the brother of Brett Schroeder, who had been killed nearly five years before, lived near Rutledge Drive. On the evening of March 24, Leonard heard a series of gunshots. Shortly afterwards, Drummond and Gilliam arrived at Leonard’s home in Gilliam’s car. Leonard asked Drummond about the shots, and Drummond said that he “didn’t know who it is. It was probably Cricket and Wany.” Gilliam said only that “some fools are shooting over there.”
{¶ 13} Arriving police and paramedics found that Jiyen had been killed. Investigators secured the scene and began their investigation. Officer Kerry Wigley walked down Rutledge Drive, looking for shell casings, and noticed two men in the dark, leaning against a car parked in a driveway. Wigley intercepted the two men, asked for their identification, and identified them as Drummond and Gilliam.
{¶ 14} During the investigation, Patrolman David Wilson found ten cartridge casings from assault-rifle ammunition lying between two houses that were across the street and several houses away from the Dent home on Rutledge Drive. The police also found six 9 mm shell casings at the corner of Rutledge Drive and Duncan Lane.
{¶ 15} Investigators found that someone had fired 11 bullets from an assault rifle into the Dent home. Three bullets had hit the house near the front door, three others had hit elsewhere on the front of the house, and five bullets had hit the west side of the house where the bedrooms were located. A 9 mm bullet hole was also found on the east side of the Dent home.
{¶ 16} Ed Carlini, an Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation (“BCI”) agent, examined the trajectory of the bullets entering the Dent home. Carlini determined that the shots had originated from a location on Rutledge Drive where ten shell casings were found. He also determined that the 9 mm shot that hit the Dent home originated from east of the house.
{¶ 17} Carlini and Officer Anthony Marzullo, a crime lab technician, examined bullet holes inside the Dent home. There were five bullet holes inside the southwest bedroom and three bullet holes inside the northwest bedroom. One bullet entered the living room, fragmented, and was found in the far living-room wall. A 9 mm slug was found in the kitchen wall. Marzullo recovered other bullet fragments and copper-jacketed slugs inside the house. He also recovered bullet fragments and bits of blue plastic that had been removed from the victim during the autopsy.
{¶ 18} Andrew Chappell, a ballistics expert, compared the ten 7.62 x 39 mm assault-rifle cartridge casings and concluded that they could have been fired from the same firearm. He stated that an assault rifle such as an AK-47 semiautomatic rifle would have fired this ammunition. Chappell examined the six 9 mm cartridge casings and concluded that each of the casings had been fired from the same firearm. Chappell also examined the slugs and bullet fragments obtained from the Dent home and identified one 9 mm Luger bullet, a 7.62 mm bullet, a 7.62 mm bullet jacket fragment, a piece of metal, and a couple of lead fragments. He determined that the 7.62 bullet and the 7.62 bullet jacket fragment were fired from the same weapon, but he was unable to make any comparisons with the lead fragment and the blue plastic recovered from the victim at the autopsy.
{¶ 19} As the murder investigation progressed, Drummond and Gilliam were identified as suspects. On March 27, 2003, the police searched Drummond’s Rutledge Drive residence and arrested him. When he was arrested, Drummond told police “that he had nothing to do with the shooting of the baby. He was on Duncan Lane that night and heard gunshots and he walked to Rutledge to see what had happened.” During the search, the police seized a drum containing 75 rounds of 7.62 x 39 mm ammunition, three boxes containing 46 rounds of 7.62 x 39 mm ammunition, a single round of 7.62 x 39 mm ammunition, an empty AK magazine, a Taurus 9 mm handgun with no barrel, a bulletproof vest, and several rounds of 9 mm, .45 caliber, and .357 caliber ammunition.
{¶ 20} During the search of Drummond’s residence, police also seized an album of gang photographs of the Lincoln Knolls Crips. Drummond appears in many photographs. The album also contained a number of photographs and tributes to Brett Schroeder and other members of the gang who had been killed. One page of the album shows two photographs of Drummond with a cake that says, “RIP Brett.” Another photograph shows tattoos of guns, tombstones, and other symbols on Drummond’s back. The tombstone tattoo contains Schroeder’s name and names of Drummond’s other dead friends.
{¶ 21} Dr. Dorothy Dean, Deputy Coroner for Franklin County, conducted the autopsy of three-month-old Jiyen. Dean testified that Jiyen died from a gunshot wound to the head. The entry wound was on the back of Jiyen’s head, and the exit wound was just below the left eye.
{¶ 22} Between March and August 2003, Chauncey Walker and Drummond were incarcerated in the same cellblock at the Mahoning County jail. Drummond talked to Walker about his case almost “[e]very single day.” Walker testified, “[A]s soon as he’d come out of his cell, he’d come directly to my cell * * * [and] he’d be talking to me about that case.” As to what happened on March 24, Drummond told Walker that he “was sitting in his sister[‘s] driveway and Wayne pulled up, and * * * he asked Wayne to take him to go get a gun somewhere. * * * So Wayne gave him a ride to go get the gun. * * * [W]hen Wayne backed up in the driveway after he * * * got the gun, the dude, Jiyen, supposed to have stayed * * * a couple houses up from his sister or right around the corner, * * * [and] he said he got out the car and fired some shots at the house and then he got back in the car and pulled off.” Drummond told Walker that “he intended to hurt whoever the bullet hit,” but “he didn’t intend to kill no baby.”
{¶ 23} Nathaniel Morris was another inmate in the same cellblock with Drummond and Walker. During May 2003, Morris overheard Drummond tell Walker that “he didn’t meant [sic] to kill the baby; he was trying to get at somebody else * * *.” On more than one occasion, Morris overheard Drummond asking Walker, “[Y]ou think I’m going to get convicted on this, you think they have anything on me, stuff like that.”
https://caselaw.findlaw.com/oh-supreme-court/1358308.html
