A second man has been sentenced to life in prison for a 2022 shooting that killed a teenager and his 5-year-old cousin.
A Tarrant County jury convicted Anthony Bell-Johnson, 24, of capital murder for the deaths of 17-year-old Jamarrien Monroe and 5-year-old Rayshard Scott, the county’s district attorney’s office announced Monday in a news release. Monroe’s 18-month-old son was also shot, but survived.
In Texas — if the state chooses not to pursue the death penalty — capital murder convictions come with an automatic sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Bell-Johnson was given two life sentences, one for each victim. He was also ordered to pay $20,000 in fines.
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On Aug. 28, 2022, Bell-Johnson and Nixon-Clark parked near a house on Steel Dust Drive where Scott, Monroe and others were playing outside.
Bell-Johnson was 21. Nixon-Clark was 16.
The pair watched the group from their car for a few minutes before running toward the house with masks and rifles, the news release said.
Bell-Johnson alone fired more than a dozen times, according to the district attorney’s office.
“They executed two of those children,” prosecutor Melinda Hogan told the jury, according to the release.
Police arrested Bell-Johnson and Nixon-Clark less than a week later. The keys to the “getaway car,” the news release said, were found in Bell-Johnson’s pocket.
Nixon-Clark, now 20, was also sentenced to life in prison in January 2025. Because he was 16 at the time of the shooting, he will be eligible for parole after serving 40 years.
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