Former UVA student who killed 3 football players in 2022 shooting given 5 life sentences
Christopher Darnell Jones Jr., a former University of Virginia student who killed three UVA football players and injured two other classmates in a 2022 shooting, was sentenced to life in prison Friday.
Jones, now 26, received a life sentence for each of his three first-degree murder charges and for each of his two aggravated malicious wounding charges, according to WRIC in Charlottesville.
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Those five life sentences are to be served consecutively.
Jones opened fire on a bus of students in an on-campus parking garage on Nov. 13, 2022, following a class trip to Washington, D.C., where students had seen the play, “The Ballad of Emmett Till.” In the process, Jones killed Devin Chandler, Lavel Davis Jr. and D’Sean Perry. All three were members of UVA’s 2022 football team. A fourth, running back Mike Hollins, was wounded, and so was another student, Marlee Morgan.
While Jones was listed on the 2018 football roster as a freshman running back from Petersburg, Virginia, he didn’t appear in any games for the team. He wasn’t a member of the football program at the time of the shooting.
When he addressed the victims’ families in court Friday, Jones said he didn’t know Chandler, Davis and Perry.
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“I didn’t know your sons. I didn’t know your boys. And I wish I did,” he said, per CVille Right Now.
Jones also said: “I’m so sorry. I caused so much pain.”
The defense asked its witnesses about Jones’ traumatic childhood and mental health decline in the years leading up to the shooting.
Jones’ relatives testified that he was both verbally and physically abused by his parents during his childhood, WTVR-TV reported. By the summer of 2022, Jones was “more paranoid,” his uncle said. Jones’ cousin recalled him repeatedly looking over his shoulder and voicing that people were around the corner and out to get him, as reported by WTVR-TV.
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During cross-examination, the commonwealth’s attorney cited a text Jones had sent a fraternity brother, whom the defense had called as a witness. In the text, Jones appeared to threaten violence toward co-workers, whom he had feared were stalking him, according to CVille Right Now.
Jones pleaded guilty last year. Under the plea agreement he signed, he faced at least 23 years in prison, according to The Washington Post. Prosecutors recommended he be sentenced to life.
Jones ultimately received the maximum penalty of five life sentences.
