ALLENTOWN, Pa. – A man recently sentenced in the shooting death of a 61-year-old in Allentown is also a person of interest in a decade-old homicide in Missouri.<\/p>\n
Evander Thompson, 32, was found guilty on July 30 of first-degree murder and firearms not to be carried without a license, the Lehigh County District Attorney\u2019s Office said in a news release.<\/p>\n
Thompson was sentenced Wednesday to life in prison without parole and an additional three to seven years for the weapons charge, the DA\u2019s office said.<\/p>\n
The DA\u2019s office said Thompson is also a person of interest in the shooting death of a 16-year-old in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2016.<\/p>\n
16-year-old Maleaha Journ\u2019e Talton\u2019s body was found beaten, shot in the head, and wrapped in a carpet found along a wooded trail, according to the DA\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
The DA\u2019s office said nobody has been charged in that case yet.<\/p>\n
The homicide investigation remains open with the Ferguson, Missouri Police Department, and anyone with information may call 314-522-3100.<\/p>\n
The jury convicted Thompson back in July of killing Orlando Ibanez, who died Sept. 23, 2023, according to the DA\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
Ibanez, of Allentown, died from a gunshot wound to his neck, and his death was ruled a homicide by Lehigh County Coroner Daniel Buglio, according to the news release.<\/p>\n
Just before 2 a.m. on Sept. 23, 2023, Allentown Police responded to a 911 call for a shooting on the second floor of an apartment building on W. Allen St., the DA\u2019s office said.<\/p>\n
The DA\u2019s office said officers found Ibanez at the entrance to his apartment and saw a shell casing near his body.<\/p>\n
City surveillance cameras showed a man later identified as Thompson go into a West Allen Street home just before the shooting where he stayed several minutes before running away, according to the news release.<\/p>\n
The DA\u2019s office said video footage showed Thompson using his cellphone moments after the shooting.<\/p>\n
According to the DA\u2019s office, Thompson texted to another person the words, \u201che dead.\u201d<\/p>\n
City and privately-owned cameras also showed Thompson walking to the scene of the shooting from his home at 230 N. Nagle St. and returning home after the shooting, according to the DA\u2019s office.<\/p>\n
Authorities later found a gun on the son of the person Thompson texted after the shooting, the DA\u2019s office said.<\/p>\n
The Lehigh County District Attorney\u2019s Firearm and Tool Mark Laboratory compared that gun to the shell casing found at the homicide scene and the projectile recovered from the victim at the autopsy, authorities said.<\/p>\n
Investigators determined both items matched the gun recovered from the minor, according to the news release.<\/p>\n
Police and analysts with the Regional Intelligence and Investigative Center also found a video Thompson recorded showing himself with a gun consistent with the murder weapon, the DA\u2019s office said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALLENTOWN, Pa. – A man recently sentenced in the shooting death of a 61-year-old in Allentown is also…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307311,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[119,153,155,154,126013,126015,126014],"class_list":["post-307310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-allentown","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-evander-thompson","tag-maleaha-journ","tag-orlando-ibanez"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307310\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307311"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}