Hughes
By Kimberly Pistone
For the Sidney Daily News
SIDNEY — It took less than an hour for a Shelby County Common Pleas jury to find Lashawn D. Hughes, 49, guilty of murder for shooting Brandon Tyler Welsh a year ago. Both were semi-truck drivers who were involved in an altercation in northern Sidney.
Hughes was found guilty on one count murder, a unclassified felony, with a specification of discharging a firearm from inside a vehicle, one count having weapons while under disability, a third degree felony, and one count tampering with evidence, a third degree felony.
A sentencing hearing has been set for Oct. 25.
Before the trial began, Hughes gave notification that he was going to plead self-defense rather than not guilty. The state was represented by Shelby County Prosecutor Tim Sell and Hughes was represented by Laura Waymire, Shelby County Assistant Public Defender.
Both the prosecution and defense agreed on the following facts.
On Aug. 30, 2023, Welsh and Hughes were driving their semi-trucks on Interstate 75 when they were involved in a minor accident. Hughes did not stop for the accident and Welsh followed him for several miles before Hughes exited at the St. Marys Avenue exit. This information was corroborated by dash cam video from Welsh’s truck.
Hughes pulled into the driveway of Conform in Sidney. Hughes stopped his semi-truck along the narrow lane by Conform. Welsh stopped behind him. Dash cam footage shows Welsh walking toward Hughes’ truck, but Welsh moves out of sight before reaching him. Welsh did not have any weapons in his hands.
Additional video footage from both Welsh’s dash cam and the dash cam of another semi driver who happened to be making a delivery to Conform and had pulled in behind Welsh, shows Hughes pulling away from the scene 49 seconds later. A few seconds later Hughes’ truck has turned around and exits the Conform parking lot. When he drove past Welsh’s body, he drove through a pool of blood, leaving bloody tire tracks on the pavement and blood evidence on the tires.
At this point, the third truck driver, Jake Rager, testified that he wondered why the truck in front of him hadn’t moved, so he pulled forward a bit and saw a body on the ground. He called 911. Welsh had been shot in his left eye and was left dead at the scene.
Sidney police put out a BOLO on the truck, which had been identified by Rager and another witness. Anna Chief of Police Darrin Goudy saw the described semi-truck exiting the freeway in Anna and started pursuit. The truck did not stop immediately, and drove in a circle around L & O Tire before finally stopping. Hughes was arrested. The gun was not in the truck.
Both prosecution and defense attorneys also agreed that Hughes had a prior murder conviction from 1993, and due to this crime was prohibited from having a gun.
The prosecution called 19 witnesses, including the 911 dispatcher, Welsh’s friend who was on the phone with Welsh when the accident on I75 occurred, the truck driver who pulled in behind Welsh at Conform, police officers and three expert witnesses. Evidence submitted during the trial included a photo found on Hughes’ phone that included the gun used with a visible serial number which was matched to the gun when it was found.
Testimony from police included the search for the gun. Based on video from security cameras at L & O Tire, the police were able to determine that Hughes swerved wide, close to a weedy patch next to a field. When they searched that area they were able to find the gun.
The question the jury had to decide was not if Hughes committed the murder, but if it was an act of self-defense. Hughes chose to take the stand to give his version of what happened that day, including the 49 seconds not caught on dash cam footage.
According to Hughes, he did not realize he hit Welsh’s truck while on the I-75. It was a minor accident, with very little damage to either truck. He said he did not see Welsh and did not feel his truck hitting Welsh’s truck.
Hughes said he was on the phone with his dispatch because he was lost and was going to be too late to deliver his load to Indiana, so dispatch was trying to find another place for him to deliver. He said he had a palletized load and because of that he could only deliver to certain places. He said that dispatch gave him an address and he was trying to find it when he pulled into Conform. He also said he pulled into Conform because he had to use the restroom and that he was on the phone with his wife.
Hughes said that when he was using the restroom at Conform he heard someone banging on his truck, so he came to the front. He described Welsh as looking agitated and upset. When Welsh told him he hit his truck, Hughes said he would get his paperwork and told Welsh to get his. Hughes said at that point Welsh yelled obscenities at him, opened Hughes’ door, and began to pull Hughes out of the truck by his leg. He said he hit his shoulder on the steering wheel and he was worried that if he was pulled out of the truck he would hit his head and people have died from similar head injuries. So he reached into the panel of his door and pulled out the gun he kept there. He said he shot at Welsh.
Hughes also said he panicked, which is why he left the scene. He called his wife and was trying to figure out what to do. He said he didn’t hear the police sirens or see the lights because he was on the phone with his wife.
Hughes said the reason he threw the gun was because he was scared that if he still had the gun when he stopped for the police he was afraid they would shoot him because he shot a white man. Hughes was described as a black man, but Hughes says he is not a black man, he is a Moor.
Additionally, when Hughes was arrested he did not say it was self-defense and he told the officer in his interview that he just drove through Sidney like everyone else does on the I-75. Because Hughes testified, the video of the police interview before he said he wanted his lawyer was allowed to be shown to the jury.
Regarding having the gun while under disability, Hughes said he was a co-conspirator when he was a kid, that he took responsibility and that he thought the gun restriction had been taken care of by an attorney because it was 30 years ago.
In closing arguments, Sell laid out the facts that were undisputed, and said that we didn’t know what happened in the 49 seconds, but the jury could infer Hughes’ purpose, and that a headshot serves no other purpose than to kill.
Sell told the jury that until the evidence began to accumulate – DNA, blood, the gun, the videos, and ballistics, that Hughes said it wasn’t him. Sell described Hughes’ testimony as a tangled web of lies where Hughes practiced to deceive. When caught in a lie, he had to create another lie, leaving a story with no consistency. Sell asked the jury to think why would Welsh get angry and pull Hughes out of the truck if Hughes was getting the information Welsh wanted in regards to the accident.
In her closing arguments, Waymire said Sell tried to put words into her client’s mouth. She said Hughes saw an angry man yelling at him, yelling profanities, who opened Hughes’ door and began pulling him out of the truck. Waymire said the whole altercation took less than 50 seconds and Hughes had no time to think, just react.
Sell, Waymire and Judge James Stevenson all described the elements required to return a verdict of self-defense. First, the defendant was not at fault in creating the situation, the defendant had a bona fide belief that he was in imminent danger, his only escape was by using force, and that he did not use an unreasonable amount of force. Stevenson also said the jury was to put themselves in the position of the defendant and consider the conduct of the victim – did the defendant reasonably believe he was in danger.
The jury deliberated for less than an hour before returning a verdict of guilty on all three charged and the specification.
