No death penalty: Jury convicts Larry Darnell Young of manslaughter in teen girl's fatal shooting

WEST PALM BEACH — Tamia Johnson’s mother walked into the courtroom slowly, her hands in front of her as if she might fall. After years of anguish and weeks of testimony about the shooting death of her 16-year-old daughter, the jury had reached a verdict.

Larry Darnell Young Jr. looked more at ease. He returned his mother’s smile while the bailiffs escorted him inside, his wrists shackled behind his back. The grin — gold-plated, like the man witnesses said killed Johnson — disappeared when the jury filed in. He squinted at their expressions.

If they believed the prosecutors, Young murdered Johnson while trying to kill two other women fighting with his girlfriend in 2021. Young said he didn’t have a gun when he pulled up to the brawl, let alone pull the trigger.

Jurors landed somewhere in between both stories. Young didn’t mean to kill anyone, they decided, but he was the gunman responsible for Johnson’s death. The jury convicted Young of manslaughter, sparing him and themselves an automatic second trial to weigh whether the 27-year-old man should lose his life for taking Johnson’s.

Johnson’s mother and Young’s both seemed to sink. Young smiled a second time as he left the courtroom.

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Family feud prompted fatal shootout in front of West Palm apartments

A fight between Young’s girlfriend and her aunt preceded the fatal shooting outside of a West Palm Beach apartment complex on Dec. 10, 2021. Assistant State Attorney Marci Rex played a video of the confrontation near 17th Street and Spruce Avenue, recorded on a witness’ cellphone.

The scene was chaotic. Two groups of women spat threats and insults at one another, one screaming, “It’s going to be a murder scene!” She was right.

The woman, Shalontay Ashe, testified that she heard her niece call Young on the phone, urging him to come “shoot it up.” Ashe said she saw Young run across the street minutes later with a long black gun in his hand before taking aim from the middle of an empty field.

Johnson and her parents sat in a parked car down the street, ears piqued by the sound of women screaming. It was too dark to see what was happening, Johnson’s stepfather said, but he could tell things were getting out of hand.

He lifted his foot off the brake pedal to put the car in reverse at the same moment that a stray bullet struck his daughter in the head.

Facing the death penalty, Larry Darnell Young testified in his own defense

Whoever fired that shot likely did so to break up the fight, said Assistant Public Defender Renee Sihvola, who represented Young alongside Public Defender Carey Haughwout and Assistant Public Defender Courtney Wilson.

Sihvola pointed to a map that showed the location of the women prosecutors said Young was trying to kill and the parked car where the bullet actually went. They were nowhere near one another.

She disputed the testimony of Ashe and Ashe’s sister identifying Young as the shooter, arguing that their feud with Young’s girlfriend impaired their judgment. A third woman with no relationship with the sisters, but who dated Young’s brother when they were teenagers and shared friends with his girlfriend, also said Young was the shooter.

"Anyone who knows Larry knows that was Larry," she said.

Young testified in his defense, insisting that he arrived only with the intention of picking up his girlfriend, who had called him tens of times in a span of minutes, pressing him to hurry. Police said they saw Keosha Carn delete those calls from her cellphone’s call logs when they arrived to investigate the shooting.

Carn did not testify. She is awaiting her own trial on the same charges Young faced.

Young said Ashe saw him arrive, and he heard her shout behind her: “She called Larry! Air this (expletive) out! Air it out!”

He said he heard the gunshots next and threw his car into reverse, panicked for the safety of his two young children in the backseat. Rex said during her closing argument with Assistant State Attorney Chrichet Mixon that she didn’t believe his children were in the car at all.

The jury listened to recordings of each person’s testimony a second time during their deliberations, which began Monday after a week of recess. Their verdict Wednesday concludes their role in the near-monthlong trial, but Young and the attorneys will return to court at 1:30 p.m. April 28 for his sentencing hearing.

Circuit Judge Howard Coates must sentence Young to at least 30 years in prison for the manslaughter charge, but could add an additional five years for each of the three charges of attempted manslaughter with a firearm that jurors also found Young guilty of.

Hannah Phillips is a journalist covering public safety and criminal justice at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her at hphillips@pbpost.com.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Death penalty case: Larry Darnell Young avoids execution in teen's death