BENTON COUNTY : Gunman sentenced for stealing credit card
Posted on Saturday, November 15, 2008
BENTONVILLE — Jonesboro school gunman Mitchell Scott Johnson was sentenced to 12 years in prison Friday for stealing a credit card on the day his son was born.
Johnson, 24, also was given suspended sentences of eight and 10 years for stealing and using a debit card from the Fastrip gas station where he worked.
Circuit Court Judge Tom Keith also gave Johnson 12 months for misdemeanor marijuana possession.
Johnson will begin the 12-year sentence after he serves four years in federal prison on a gun and drug possession charge. He was convicted by a federal jury about 48 hours before he stole the credit card from a drawer at the Bentonville gas station on Jan. 31.
Police testified Johnson used the card at the gas station to steal $ 31 in gas. He then used the card in a vending machine at Washington Regional Medical Center and at a Burger King in Fayetteville.
Washington County prosecutors have issued a warrant for Johnson on theft charges in connection with the card’s use in that county.
The federal charge stemmed from a January 2007 arrest for being in possession of a loaded 9 mm handgun and shotgun while using a controlled substance. Johnson was a passenger in his own van, which was driven by Justin Wade Trammell, 23.
Trammell was 15 when he killed his father, Mike Trammell, in Bentonville in 2000. Trammell and Johnson met while serving in the Arkansas Department of Youth Services.
Johnson was 13 in 1998 when he and Andrew Golden, then 11, fatally shot a teacher and four pupils at Westside Middle School near Jonesboro. That August, Johnson, then 14, and Golden, then 12, were convicted of five counts of capital murder in Craighead County. Johnson was released from prison Aug. 11, 2005.
Keith allowed discussion of the killings at Friday’s sentencing hearing after testimony by Johnson’s mother, Gretchen Woodard.
“This is a persecution, not a prosecution,” Woodard said.
While court rules barred discussion of the shooting until after Woodard mentioned it, Keith said that he and everyone in the room is familiar with Johnson’s past.
“I don’t like these invisible gorillas running around my court room,” Keith said.
Keith made it clear that the juvenile record was only important inasmuch as it relates to Johnson’s state of mind and propensity to commit crimes. The sentence is not an extension of his juvenile term, Keith said. Johnson’s attorney argued that theft of a credit card typically doesn’t carry the same sentence. Often people are given five years probation and 30 days in county jail, he said. Woodard said her son needs to be responsible for his actions but testified that he had been abused as a child. Johnson apologized to the man he stole from and family members of the teacher he killed before being led away by deputies.
To contact this reporter: awallworth@arkansasonline. com
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