Man pleads guilty to being accessory in slaying case

March 31, 1998|By MARLO BARNHART

The second suspect in the March 23, 1997, shooting death of a New Jersey man in Hagerstown admitted Tuesday that he used beer to wipe the dead man's blood from his car.

Scott Eugene Beamer, 34, pleaded guilty Tuesday in Washington County Circuit Court to being an accessory after the fact/second-degree murder.

He agreed to testify in June against Bobby Lavaughn Johnson who is charged with shooting Michael Eric Mackason Jr. during a botched drug robbery more than a year ago.

Sentencing for Beamer will be delayed until after he's testified in the Johnson trial, according to Washington County Assistant State's Attorney Duane Gigeous.

Beamer faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison.

Gigeous said the Hagerstown City Police investigation revealed Beamer and Johnson were together on March 23 in a car.

That day the two men went to get Johnson's clothes because Beamer had agreed to let Johnson live with him for a while, according to Beamer's statement to police.

The pair pulled up to a black man and asked him for some crack. The man, later identified as Mackason, got into the car and Johnson allegedly pulled a gun on him, according to Beamer's statement to police.

"The gun went off and he was shot in the car," Gigeous said. The gun was 12 to 18 inches from Mackason's face when he was hit.

Both Beamer and Johnson pushed Mackason out of the car. Mackason, 20, of Long Branch, N.J., was found lying face down on West North Avenue. He was pronounced dead at Washington County Hospital.

Johnson eventually returned to Florida where he was apprehended and brought back to Hagerstown.

Beamer was arrested by West Virginia State Police in Falling Waters, W.Va., last August.

Johnson and Beamer were each charged originally with felony murder, second-degree murder, manslaughter, robbery, robbery with a deadly weapon, wearing or transporting a handgun in a motor vehicle, first-degree assault, second-degree assault, use of a handgun in a commission of a violent crime, attempted robbery, attempted armed robbery, conspiracy to commit robbery and conspiracy to commit armed robbery.

Beamer also was charged with accessory after the fact of robbery - the count to which he pleaded guilty on Tuesday.

Johnson, 23, of Auburndale, Fla., continues to be held in the Washington County Detention Center without bond, awaiting trial on all charges.

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