Man pleads in high-profile Columbus murder case cited in ex-DA’s prosecution

The man whose murder case helped upend a Columbus district attorney’s 10-month reign made a deal to plead guilty Monday.

Drevon Quantez Johnson pleaded to voluntary manslaughter in the 2016 fatal shooting of Richard Collier, who was gunned down during a party at his Hodges Drive home.

Johnson was tried for murder in 2021, but the case ended in a mistrial after a contentious courtroom drama that led to complaints against then-DA Mark Jones, who resigned the next year while pleading guilty to misconduct in office.

Part of the evidence against Jones was his threatening a witness to get the man to testify against Johnson, going so far as to push to get the witness charged with murder, to compel his testimony.

Because of how Jones handled the case against Johnson, it later was referred to the Georgia Attorney General for prosecution, while Jones remained in office. But once Jones resigned and current District Attorney Stacey Jackson took charge, pursuing Johnson’s case again fell to local prosecutors.

Now it has ended with Johnson’s plea before Superior Court Judge Ron Mullins, the same judge presiding in 2021 when Johnson’s jury deadlocked, leading to the mistrial.

Mullins and Jones occasionally clashed during that trial, with the judge admonishing Jones for posting public comments about the case on Facebook.

After court Monday, Collier’s mother Dawn Boyd said she supported Johnson’s plea deal partly because of the first trial, fearing what could happen, were Johnson to go before a jury again.

Besides Collier’s homicide, Johnson also pleaded guilty to charges stemming from fights at the Muscogee County Jail, where he was held while awaiting trial:

• He pleaded guilty to aggravated assault and using a knife to commit a crime for stabbing an inmate with a “shank” or homemade weapon during a fight on Dec. 23, 2021.

• He pleaded guilty to interfering with government property and providing contraband to inmates for another jail fight on July 24, 2022, when he again used a shank and damaged a jail TV.

Besides pleading to manslaughter in Collier’s case, Johnson pleaded guilty also to using a gun to commit a crime and to being a convicted felon with a firearm.

In the deal negotiated by defense attorney Anthony Johnson and Assistant District Attorney Veronica Hansis, Drevon Johnson was sentenced to serve 15 years in prison, and to remain on probation for 10 years more. He is 30 years old.

The homicide

According to the evidence presented during Johnson’s trial, Collier, 23, was shot as he came to his girlfriend’s aid when she collapsed after one of Johnson’s friends hit her during a brawl.

Investigators said they found Collier on the back porch of his home, where he was pronounced dead around 3 a.m. May 14, 2016. A medical examiner said a bullet went through his torso from left to right, at a downward angle.

Johnson ran away after the shooting, and the friends who had accompanied him to the party had to call to figure out where he was. He told them to pick him up at a nearby car wash, where he emerged from the wood line to meet them.

In recounting other evidence against Johnson, in Collier’s case, Hansis said Monday that fights broke out between feuding guests after Collier, his girlfriend and a roommate hosted 20-30 people at the house party, where many congregated in the backyard and on a back porch.

One visitor saw another man with whom he had a dispute, and recruited a friend for backup before initiating a confrontation, Hansis said. Johnson accompanied the two friends to Collier’s party, where two fights broke out on the porch.

Collier broke up the first brawl, Hansis said, and his girlfriend got hit trying to stop the second one. Collier was coming to her defense when Johnson pulled a gun and shot him, the prosecutor said.

During Johnson’s 2021 trial, police Sgt. Donna Baker testified that though some of the witnesses remained at the scene to speak with investigators, after the shooting, officers could not find Johnson, and later sought the public’s help in locating him, as Collier’s family offered a reward for tips.

U.S. Marshals arrested Johnson on July 8, 2016, in Jonesboro.

Besides murder, Johnson, who was was 23 in 2016, was tried in 2021 on charges of aggravated assault and using a firearm to commit a crime.

He also was charged with being a convicted felon with a firearm, because he already had a criminal history:

Johnson was released from prison on Feb. 21, 2016, after the state Board of Pardons and Paroles commuted his sentence on convictions that included being a felon with a firearm, theft by receiving stolen property, obstructing law enforcement, fleeing police, and auto theft, according to the Georgia Department of Corrections.

His sentence of 10-years on the theft charge started March 23, 2011. He was to serve five years in the Macon State Prison in Oglethorpe, and five more on probation.

The DA’s trial

Johnson’s case became an issue in Mark Jones’ November 2021 trial for misconduct in office when the prosecutor, Deputy Attorney General John Fowler, alleged Jones threatened a witness to try to secure his testimony in Johnson’s trial.

Fowler said that Jones’ colleague, Columbus attorney Christopher Breault, contacted the witness via Facebook, on Jones’ behalf, and that Jones tried to persuade an investigator in his office to charge the witness with murder, to have him held in jail. The witness was among those who traveled to and from Collier’s party with Johnson.

Breault later served as Jones’ defense attorney, when Jones was charged with nine felonies related to his conduct in office.

After filing court motions regarding Breault’s contacting the witness on Facebook, in Johnson’s case, Fowler used that evidence to have Breault disqualified as Jones’ attorney, arguing Breault could not defend Jones and serve as a witness at the same time. The judge agreed, and Jones had to hire new counsel.

Fowler cited Jones’ attempt to intimidate the witness in Johnson’s case as part of a pattern of trying to win murder cases at any cost. The judge emphasized that pattern while sentencing Jones to a year in prison, after he cut his misconduct trial short by pleading guilty.

The victim

After Johnson pleaded guilty Monday, Collier’s mother spoke with reporters outside the courtroom.

She said Johnson’s first trial was an experience the family did not want to relive: “It was absolutely horrific,” she said. “I still have not even processed that part.”

The family still believes Johnson deserves life in prison, for Collier’s fatal shooting, she said, but accepted the negotiated plea to avoid a second trial.

“This is not the outcome we wanted,” she said.

She sat at the prosecutor’s table with Mark Jones, during Johnson’s 2021 trial, and when she took the witness stand, Jones asked her to describe her son.

“He was kind of a stubborn kid, at the end of the day, but that was my son,” said Boyd. “He had a good heart.”

The 2010 Harris County High School graduate was working as a machine operator at Chassix Georgia Machine, before his death, she said. He was her only son, though he had three sisters, according to his Ledger-Enquirer obituary.

Asked Monday what she would remember about him, Boyd said he was friendly and popular.

“I was even amazed at how many people knew my son,” she said. “And if they knew my son, they knew that he was there to have a good time, very laid-back, easygoing.”

The family now can spend more time thinking about him, and not about his killer, she said: “Now we don’t have to focus any more on the defendant, and can focus now more on Richard’s life, celebrating his life.”