ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, April 22, 1997 TAG: 9704220066
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK THE ROANOKE TIMES
The Roanoke man said he thought he was doing the right thing when he shot Jesse Ferguson.
Cepeda R. Wiley was sentenced to eight years in prison Monday for shooting an unarmed man during a fight outside a Roanoke motel July 4, 1996.
Wiley had claimed he shot Jesse D. Ferguson in self defense, but a Circuit Court jury rejected that argument in February and convicted him of voluntary manslaughter.
At a sentencing hearing Monday, Judge Robert P. Doherty imposed the jury's recommended sentence - five years for manslaughter and three years for using a firearm.
Wiley, 22, has said he was responding to a call for help from his brother the day he killed Ferguson.
"I didn't mean to kill him," Wiley testified. "I meant to stop him from hurting my brother or myself."
"I don't think I should do a lot of time due to the fact that I thought I was doing the right thing when I got caught up doing the wrong thing."
In a statement to police last year, Wiley said his older brother, Sherrond Wiley, was with his girlfriend at the Embassy Motor Lodge on Melrose Avenue the morning of July 4. Wiley said he was at home when he got a call from his brother, who said Ferguson was at the motel causing trouble. Ferguson, 22, had once dated Sherrond Wiley's girlfriend and was angry because she had left him.
When Cepeda Wiley arrived, a fight broke out in the parking lot. Sherrond Wiley's head was smashed into a car windshield, and witnesses said Cepeda Wiley opened fire when Ferguson threatened to kill him.
Ferguson was shot twice in the side, once in the back and once in the neck.
Wiley - who had never been in trouble with the law before Ferguson's death - will have to serve 85 percent of his sentence before he is considered for release.
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