A St. Louis area man was sentenced Friday to 30 years in prison for killing a minister outside a bowling alley.Twenty-five-year-old Donté Lorenzo McGary, of Jennings, pleaded guilty to a reduced charge of second-degree murder and other counts in the death of 45-year-old Demetrius Stewart. McGary was originally charged with first-degree murder, reports the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Stewart was leaving the Tropicana Lanes bowling alley in Richmond Heights in February 2019 after a date night with his wife and other couples when a fight spilled onto the parking lot.
During the hearing, his wife, Shantana Stewart, told McGary her husband “courageously gave his own life for me” by ignoring his own safety and telling her to duck down in their car to avoid gunfire. She said previously that they’d had no interaction with those involved in the fight.
McGary apologized in court, saying there is “no excuse for things I did,” and said he hoped the Stewart family could forgive him. Stewart said Jesus Christ enabled her to forgive him and pleaded with him to ask God for forgiveness.
Her husband was an associate minister at West Side Missionary Baptist Church, who also worked at the Department of Veterans Affairs.
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