In Indiana County Court today, sentencing is scheduled for two of the four defendants in the murder of Tyron Howard, a Blairsville man who was bound, gagged, and executed with a sword in his apartment in September of 2014.
All four defendants had been charged with criminal homicide and other offenses, but two of them accepted plea bargains in exchange for their testimony against their alleged leader, Michael Eades Jr. of Tyrone. Eades was acquitted of criminal homicide and will be sentenced today for involuntary manslaughter. Stanley Boynton of Altoona pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, and will be sentenced as well.
Deandre Jones of Baltimore, Maryland, was convicted last month of second degree murder, robbery, and conspiracy to robbery and is scheduled to be sentenced next month.
The fourth defendant, Kevin King of Altoona pleaded guilty to third degree murder and was sentenced on August 28th to 10 to 20 years in state prison.
Today’s court schedule also includes sentencing for 49-year-old Gregory Rouzer, but that case might not be quite over.
Rouzer is a Fulton County man who is an inmate at SCI Pine Grove. He’s in prison for shooting and wounding a man and his girlfriend in his home county, and while imprisoned for that, trying to hire a hit man to finish the job. In January of this year, he pleaded guilty conspiracy to aggravated assault for again trying to hire a hit man, but in May he withdrew that plea to seek a jury trial. In June, he pleaded guilty to the same charge again, but in July his attorney requested transcripts of the court proceedings. They were provided to him and his criminal docket sheet does not indicate further motions on his behalf. On Wednesday, Judge Martin ordered him to court for sentencing today.
