FAYETTEVILLE -- A Springdale man pleaded guilty to murder Friday and was sentenced to 35 years in prison.
Anferney Amram, 20, was originally charged in Washington County Circuit Court with capital murder and aggravated residential burglary in the fatal shooting of Xavier Williams.
Police found Williams, 24, dead Aug. 17, 2017, in his apartment at Strawberry Meadows Place. He was shot multiple times with a 9mm handgun the day before, according to a police report.
Amram told police he shot Williams because he threatened Amram's family. He said he planned to kill Williams a few months earlier, and he stole the gun to shoot him, according to a news release from Springdale police.
"I think it's always hard to assign a term of years that adequately would even begin to represent a human life," Terra Stephenson, deputy prosecutor, said Friday. "This was five years from the max, so it was about as good a plea as I could have given the family."
During a brief hearing, Amram turned to face members of Williams' family, who were in the courtroom. He apologized and asked their forgiveness.
One of Williams' relative sobbed loudly.
Amram, who spent much of the hearing staring down, also pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated residential burglary. The two 35-year sentences handed down by Circuit Judge Mark Lindsay will run concurrently. Amram was given credit for 608 days of jail time served.
Amram would have faced life in prison without the possibility of parole or the death penalty if he had been convicted of capital murder. First-degree murder is punishable by 10 to 40 years or life in prison.
Four others face a range of charges related to Williams' murder or its aftermath. Their cases are pending.
"Everyone is charged with different crimes," Stephenson said. "Everyone has varying degrees of culpability, and so it's hard to say how those are going to play out. We're still working on those."
Junior Betero Teorea, 18, is charged with being an accomplice to capital murder. He was arraigned and charged as an adult in Washington County Circuit Court.
Teorea, of Springdale, pleaded not guilty. He was 16 at the time of the shooting. Because of his age, the death penalty isn't a possibility.
Teorea told police he pointed a gun at Williams but pretended it jammed. Teorea said Amram shot Williams several times.
Amram took the gun, pulled it apart and threw it out of a moving vehicle somewhere in Bentonville, according to a police report.
Albert Davis, 20, Billson Andrike, 21, and Tracy Schuman, 35, also were arrested in the days following the murder.
Schuman pleaded not guilty to accomplice to capital murder and hindering apprehension. Andrike and Davis pleaded not guilty to accomplice to tampering with evidence and accomplice to residential burglary.
Davis told police he and Andrike went into the apartment and picked up bullet casings and Williams' cellphone and threw them away somewhere in Springdale, according to a police report.
NW News on 04/20/2019