The 21-year-old Conway man authorities say sparked the July 2017 mass shooting at a downtown Little Rock club has pleaded guilty to killing the 14-year-old son of a drug dealer who claimed to use the money he made to fund youth programs in the city.
Tyler Clay Jackson pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and robbery in exchange for a 20-year prison sentence from Pulaski County Circuit Judge Herb Wright, according to sentencing papers filed Wednesday by deputy prosecutor Amanda Fields.
Under the plea deal negotiated by his public defender, Cheryl Barnard, the charges were reduced from capital murder and aggravated robbery. Jackson, already imprisoned for fleeing and aggravated-assault convictions in Faulkner County, will have to serve 14 years before he can qualify for parole.
Cyncere Alexander was found shot dead in his father's home in the Pleasant Pointe apartments on Green Mountain Drive. Neighbors described hearing five to six gunshots.
His killers left empty-handed. Police said a bag holding about 2 pounds of marijuana was found nearby. Three other men are charged in the slaying, one of them a former friend of the boy's father.
The teen's slaying came three weeks after more than two dozen people were injured in a late-night shootout during a rap concert at the Power Ultra Lounge at Sixth and Center streets. No one was killed in what was one of the nation's largest mass shootings that year. The club was immediately closed.
The display of resurgent gang violence in Little Rock prompted Gov. Asa Hutchison to establish a task force combining local, state and federal authorities.
The resulting investigation produced more than 50 federal indictments and led to the club performer, Ricky "Finesse2Tymes" Hampton of Memphis, and his bodyguard, Kentrell "Dirt" Gwynn, also of Memphis, going to prison for 10 years on state and federal gun charges.
Jackson, who was one of the first people arrested in the Power Ultra shooting, is accused of firing the first shot while targeting a rival gang member. He still faces two counts of second-degree battery and 10 counts of aggravated assault over the shootout. The charges together carry a maximum sentence of 72 years. His next court appearance is set for Wednesday.
Cyncere Alexander's father, Chris Lamont Alexander, now 43, had drawn city support -- including an endorsement from the police chief and the city manager -- for proclaiming his past as a gang member was behind him and helping set up a youth advocacy program intended to discourage young people from following in his footsteps, which included stints in state and federal prisons.
But by the time Cyncere Alexander, the youngest of his five children, was killed, the senior Alexander's do-gooder facade was crumbling. About a month before the slaying, Chris Alexander was arrested after leading police on a chase that reached speeds over 100 mph and caused an officer to crash. That arrest eventually led to a six-year prison sentence.
Three months after the chase, police disrupted his marijuana-dealing operation at a carwash on Daisy L. Gatson Bates Drive where Alexander ran a car-detailing business and a storefront in Jacksonville.
Alexander, whose street name is Murda or Murder, subsequently pleaded guilty to federal gun and marijuana charges and was sent to prison for 10 years. He said he got involved in marijuana trafficking to help fund his youth program.
Alexander's sentencing date fell a week before the second anniversary of his son's death. He told the judge "jealousy and greed is what took my son's life." Alexander said Cyncere "was killed at a place [where] he should have been safe."
But authorities say Cyncere Alexander, known to friends and associates as "'Lil Badass," was in danger because he got caught in the middle of a dispute between his father and one of the man's friends, Machita Mitchell Jr., both members of the Wolfe Street Crips, in a falling out over their marijuana dealings that has not been publicly made clear.
Mitchell, known as "Frog," was locked up on marijuana-trafficking charges when the teen died.
Court filings show investigators, monitoring the 43-year-old defendant in jail, have recordings of phone conversations, one of them conducted about an hour before the teenager was killed.
In that recording, Mitchell and another co-defendant in the murder case, Kenwan Sherrod, can be heard discussing sending Jackson to Chris Alexander's apartment to steal marijuana, even if Jackson had to take the contraband from the teenager by force.
The morning after the boy's slaying, Mitchell and Sherrod speak again, with the younger man telling Mitchell that Cyncere Alexander was dead. Asked by Mitchell whether anything was taken from the apartment, Sherrod says that nothing was taken, court filings show. Authorities say the 23-year-old Sherrod is Mitchell's protege.
Mitchell and Sherrod are not charged in the club shootout but the men were already on the police's radar when Cyncere Alexander was killed. Witness statements had indicated that the two were in the club, and that Mitchell gave Jackson a pistol and Sherrod urged him to use it on Jackson's rival.
Mitchell has been jailed since his arrest four days after the club shooting after a raid at his home where police seized two guns, 84 pounds of marijuana and $23,700, which included 72 $100 bills and $15,640 in $20 bills.
The raid led to indictments, with Mitchell pleading guilty to federal marijuana and gun charges last month. A sentencing date is pending. Sherrod was arrested in May 2018 after being indicted in the same marijuana case. The men were subsequently charged with capital murder and aggravated robbery in Cyncere Alexander's death in July 2018.
The third defendant is 21-year-old Keterrioun Chandler of North Little Rock, who told police that he had driven Jackson to the apartment complex where the Alexanders lived, knowing that Jackson planned to rob someone. According to police testimony, Chandler said he waited in the car while Jackson went into the apartment. Chandler said he heard shots and that Jackson returned to the car empty-handed, saying he couldn't find anything to steal.
Jackson told him he had shot Cyncere Alexander because he thought the teen had a gun, Chandler told police. Chandler said he sent Jackson back into the apartment for a second search but when Jackson still couldn't find anything to take, Chandler drove them away.
Both Chandler and Sherrod are in jail.
Metro on 11/15/2019