A 26-year-old Sherwood man who accidentally killed his best friend in a February 2015 shootout at a Little Rock hotel was sentenced to four years in prison Monday.
Michael Cordell Strickland Jr., a 24-year-old father of two girls, was an innocent victim, killed in the crossfire at the Americas Best Value Inn on Scott Hamilton Drive, deputy prosecutor Scott Duncan told Circuit Judge Herb Wright at the sentencing hearing for Ralph Waldo Armstrong. He faced a maximum of 10 years in prison.
Armstrong pleaded guilty to manslaughter, reduced from first-degree murder, last month in an arrangement with prosecutors to also drop 10 counts of committing a terroristic act.
In exchange for Armstrong's guilty plea, prosecutors agreed not to make a specific sentencing recommendation to the judge. Wright imposed the four-year sentence after a hearing Monday.
Armstrong, who had asked to be sentenced to probation, testified that he didn't know "Little Mike," whom he'd been friends with since childhood, was even at the hotel. He apologized to the man's family and said he regretted he hadn't done so sooner but had not contacted them at the advice of his attorney.
Armstrong acknowledged on the witness stand that his 2010 felony drug-possession convictions bar him from owning a gun, but that he had a .40-caliber pistol with him on the day of the slaying and fired the weapon. Duncan told the judge that admission warranted prison time.
"This is what happens when people are armed with weapons when they shouldn't be [and] go out and shoot guns," Duncan told the judge. "Innocent people get killed."
But defense attorney David Cannon argued that Armstrong was forced to fire his gun to protect himself, his brother and a friend from the man who police say started the shooting, Jamie Olatreece Clayton, 22, of Little Rock.
Cannon said Armstrong didn't know Strickland was inside the hotel room where Clayton had briefly taken refuge during the shooting. Clayton, who was not charged in the shooting, is responsible for Strickland's death, the attorney said.
"Jamie Clayton did this," Cannon told the judge. "My client was reckless. He is remorseful. He is going to have to live with the fact he killed one of his best friends for the rest of his life."
Clayton had been feuding for some time with the front-seat passenger in Armstrong's car, 24-year-old Calvin Bernard Williams of North Little Rock, and shot Williams in the chest after the men crossed paths at the hotel, detective Matt Hoffine testified. Williams has also been charged with murder in Strickland's slaying, with his trial set for September.
Cannon said Armstrong laid down "suppressing fire" so that he and his brother, 26-year-old Kalone Deshun McGee, the third person in Armstrong's car, could rescue Williams. Armstrong could not drive away, Cannon said, because Clayton had pulled a gun and threatened to shoot the vehicle if it moved. His client likely saved all three of their lives, the attorney told the judge.
Prosecutors agreed to the manslaughter charge after a key witness, a man who saw the shooting, changed his story about who started the gunfight to say that Clayton fired the first shot. Clayton was wounded in the shootout.
He is now serving a five-year sentence in state prison on felony theft, battery and assault charges but has been federally indicted on a felon in possession of a firearm charge following his arrest after the shooting. He is scheduled to stand trial in December.
Strickland's mother, Belinda Strickland; his sister, Diamond Fletcher; and the mother of his daughters, Jamika Young, all told the judge that they believed Strickland's death had been an accident and that he and Armstrong had been close friends since childhood.
Belinda Strickland said she thought of Armstrong as a member of the family.
"I don't have no hard feelings against you, but I miss my son," she told Armstrong.
The three also blamed Clayton for Strickland's death.
"If it wasn't for him, they wouldn't be shooting," Belinda Strickland said.
Court records show Armstrong's biological father, also named Ralph Armstrong, now 45, is serving a life sentence for his 2005 capital murder conviction for killing his 33-year-old pregnant wife and their unborn child on Valentine's Day 2004.
Dashunda Armstrong, his third wife, had been five months pregnant when her remains were found in a burning van on McDonald Road in southeast Pulaski County. She had been shot twice. The couple was divorcing, and Armstrong was behind on his child-support payments.
The defendant's grandfather is photographer Ralph Waldo Armstrong III, who died in November 2006 at age 81. The senior Armstrong spent 54 years, from 1951 until his death, photographing lives of blacks in Little Rock, mostly while working as a postal carrier.
Metro on 06/21/2016