Jaiden Williams told a Gwinnett County courtroom he had been friends with the teenager he shot three years ago outside a Kroger store.
But prosecutors believe Williams and 17-year-old Orbit Pough III were strangers before exchanging gunfire during a botched drug deal, the Gwinnett district attorney said Friday. Pough was killed in the July 2021 shooting and Williams was left paralyzed from the waist down.
Late Thursday, Williams was convicted on two counts of felony murder, aggravated assault, criminal attempt to commit a felony and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. He was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole, plus five years on probation.
“The victim’s family suffered a tragic loss,” DA Patsy Austin-Gatson said in a statement. “The defendant was only 17 years old when he took the victim’s life. This sentence will be a long and hard lesson for him to learn from. But we simply cannot tolerate our young people following such violent paths.”
According to investigators, Williams told Pough that he wanted to buy a TCH vape cartridge on July 26, 2021. Williams was not carrying any money to make the purchase when he met Pough at the Kroger parking lot in Grayson, but he did have a gun.
Williams said that on the night of the shooting, he was riding in the car with Pough on the way to a drug deal. When Williams thought Pough looked suspicious, he shot him, Williams told investigators.
Credit: Gwinnett County Sheriff's Office
Credit: Gwinnett County Sheriff's Office
Pough also had a gun and returned fire, according to investigators. He died at the scene from a gunshot wound to his side.
Williams was shot in the neck, according to the DA’s office.
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