A three-judge State Superior Court panel has denied an appeal by 33-year-old Deandre Payton Jones, Jr., who was seeking a reversal of his murder conviction for the killing of a Blairsville man in 2014.
Writing that Jones’ appeal “is essentially that the jury should have believed him” instead of the evidence against him, the court said it would not reweigh the evidence and make that judgment.
Jones was found guilty of second degree murder, robbery, and conspiracy to robbery in 2017. He is serving life in prison with no chance at parole and is currently an inmate at SCI Pine Grove.
It’s a complicated case that involved four defendants. The 33-year-old Jones, who is from Baltimore, Maryland man accompanied Michael Eades Jr., Stanley Boynton, and Kevin King to the Blairsville apartment of Tyron Howard, who was a dealer in a drug ring operated by Eades. Prosecutors contended that Eades felt Howard was cheating him out of drug money and had decided to confront him about it. Jones tied Howard up and King then took a sword from Howard’s collection and stabbed him repeatedly. In his trial, Eades beat a charge of first degree murder and was convicted of involuntary manslaughter. Boynton and King pleaded guilty to lesser charges – King to third degree murder – in exchange for testifying against Eades.
The Superior Court decision also rejects defense arguments that Jones’ attorney was not informed that King had accepted a plea bargain, that Judge William Martin should not have allowed the jury to see the blood-stained sword used in the attack, and that the verdict exceeded the weight of the evidence.
