Three Ohio Gang Members Wanted to Buy Some Drugs. Instead, the Alleged Dealer and His Pregnant Fiancée Wound Up Dead.

An Ohio gang member killed a drug dealer and his pregnant fiancée in a botched robbery.

Now, he's spending decades behind bars.

In Ohio, Franklin County Common Pleas Judge Julie Lynch sentenced Mario Wade, 25, to 72 years in prison for the shooting death of Keith Williams, 23, and Marlazia Jones-Mattox, 21. Wade was found guilty and convicted by a jury of two counts of aggravated murder, possession of a weapon while under disability and other charges, including firearm and gang specifications.

On Jan. 1, 2018, officers responded to the victim’s Hilltop neighborhood residence after reports of a shooting. Upon arrival, they found Williams, Jones-Mattox and a 15-year-old assailant with critical gunshot wounds.

Williams was declared dead on the scene, while his fiancée, who was nine months pregnant, died at the Mount Carmel West hospital before her child was delivered with cerebral palsy due to a lack of oxygen, reported The Columbus Dispatch,

According to prosecutors, Wade, then-19-year-old Christian Dillion and a 15-year-old were driven to the couple’s residence by then-18-year-old Alianna Royster to buy drugs. Along the way, the three boys, who were members of the Hilltop Hot Boys street gang, decided to rob Williams.

However, Williams shot the 15-year-old in self-defense during the robbery before Wade shot him nine times. Then, as the boys were about to leave, they heard Jones-Mattox’s screams when she tried to exit the residence through the window. As a result, Dillon shot her five times in the back at close range before they fled the scene.

Later, investigators recovered all three weapons used in the homicide after Wade and Dillon dumped the guns in two separate sewers in Big Walnut Creek. In addition, the state’s crime lab also linked both the defendant’s DNA to the weapons.

Dillon was convicted of the same charges and was sentenced to 78 years in prison, while Royster pleaded guilty to aggravated robbery and was sentenced to two years of probation after she served over a year behind bars and almost nine months on house arrest, reported The Columbus Dispatch.