DeKalb County authorities are expecting Christopher Merritt — the man tied to the 2014 murder of a 19-year-old woman waiting at a MARTA bus stop — to enter a guilty plea Tuesday.
Merritt, 19, is facing the death penalty in connection with the Nov. 23 murder of Marcaysia Dawkins, a Lithonia High School graduate. Authorities believe Dawkins was waiting at a Fairington Road MARTA stop when Merritt approached and attempted to steal her purse.
During the subsequent struggle, Merritt shot Dawkins twice with a 9mm handgun, police have said.
Dawkins, who graduated high school just a few months earlier, later died at Grady Memorial Hospital. She was headed to the gym that day, her family said, as part of an initiative to get herself in shape so she could join the Navy.
“She was a great kid. And she did not deserve none of this,” Mia Jones, Dawkins’ aunt, said in November. “You couldn’t just take what you needed to take and keep it moving. You just had to… you had to kill her.”
Merritt has also been charged with the alleged sexual assaults and robberies of three different women in DeKalb County. According to the indictment handed down in January, those offenses occurred on Jan. 9, 2013; April 23, 2013; and June 29, 2014.
The district attorney’s office is expecting Merritt to enter a guilty plea Tuesday morning in front of Superior Court Judge Gail Flake, spokesman Erik Burton said. The conditions of that potential plea — and the possible sentence to follow — were unclear.
Charges in the Dawkins case include malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault and armed robbery.
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