Former UVA football player pleads guilty to killing three students on campus
A former University of Virginia student pleaded guilty Wednesday to fatally shooting three football players and wounding two other students on the campus in 2022.Christopher Darnell Jones Jr., 25, pleaded guilty to three counts of first-degree murder, two counts of aggravated malicious wounding, and five counts of use of a firearm in the commission of a felony.A four-day sentencing hearing is scheduled to open on Feb.
4 in Albemarle County Circuit Court.Prosecutors read a summary in court Wednesday of what they allege happened the day of the shooting, including chilling details not publicly released before.While riding on the bus in the hours before the shooting, Jones texted an adult mentor he had known for several years and stated, “Tonight I’m either going to hell or jail.I’m sorry,” according to the summary.
The Associated Press obtained a draft copy of the summary.Jones had been scheduled to stand trial in January on charges including aggravated murder, which carries a mandatory sentence of life without parole in Virginia.The first-degree murder charges he pleaded guilty to in a plea agreement with prosecutors carry a sentence of 20 years to life.Authorities said Jones opened fire aboard a charter bus as he and other students arrived back on campus after seeing a play and having dinner together in Washington, D.C.
The shooting erupted near a parking garage and prompted a 12-hour lockdown of the Charlottesville campus until the suspect was captured.Many at the school of some 23,000 students huddled inside closets and darkened dorm rooms, while others barricaded the doors of the university’s stately academic buildings.The university founded by Thomas Jefferson in 1819 also endured the violent “Unite the Right” rally in 2017, which drew hundreds of white nationalists protesting the planned removal of a Confederate statue.A car plowed into a crowd of counter-protesters, killing one person and injuring several others.Authorities had not rele...