Third defendant in rural shootout gets 28 years to life behind bars

The third of four defendants from a Feb. 15 New Marshfield shootout made an impassioned declaration of his innocence in court after being convicted of murder and aggravated robbery late Thursday.

Like two previous defendants convicted in connection with the incident, however, 17-year-old Abdifatah Abdi was sentenced to 28 years to life in prison for a gunfight in which a 39-year-old Meigs County man died.

(During Abdi's trial, his attorneys presented testimony suggesting he is actually 16.)

After hearing final arguments in the case Wednesday, Athens County Common Pleas Judge Michael Ward sent the jury home, and had them reconvene Thursday morning. After hearing instructions, the jury went into deliberations about 10 a.m.

It wasn't until some nine hours later that they reached a verdict, and when they returned to the courtroom, it appeared that some of them had been crying.

Abdi's mother, who was in the courtroom, burst into wild lamentations upon hearing the verdict, crying out, "It's not fair! My son never killed nobody! Oh my God!"

Abdi, too, insisted on his innocence, telling Sharon Tucker, mother of the slain man Donnie Putnam, that he is sorry for her son's death, but didn't cause it.

He said that during the shootout in which Putnam was killed, the fatal shot came from inside a trailer from which people were shooting out, not from the outside where he and the other defendants were.

"Everyone sitting here knows, those shots did come out of the house," he declared. "If you want to blame anybody (for Putnam's death), blame those people in the house that were wired up on crack." (Some witnesses who were inside the trailer had testified that they had smoked crack cocaine before the incident.)

Abdi and three others were arrested for having come to the New Marshfield home of Billy Osborne, Jr., shortly after midnight, packing guns and planning to collect on a debt that Osborne supposedly owed to fellow New Marshfield resident Phillip Dionte Boler for cocaine.

A gunfight broke out, and when Putnam arrived on scene, apparently planning to buy drugs, he was killed by a 9mm bullet in the crossfire.

Boler, 27, and Mohat Osman, 17, of Columbus, had already been convicted and sentenced to 28 to life when Abdi went on trial.

This leaves one more defendant, a woman, 21-year-old Hamda Jama, who like the others is facing counts of murder and aggravated robbery. The murder charge is one of so-called "felony murder," which doesn't require that any of the defendants actually pulled the trigger on the gun that killed Putnam. It is enough, legally, that they initiated a felony during which Putnam died.

During closing arguments, Athens County assistant prosecutor Rob Driscoll said that in shooting at the intruders, Osborne was exercising his legal right to defend "his home, his castle, where his family was."

While the main victim in the case was Donnie Putnam, he said, "Bill Osborne is the victim in this case as well.

Though the defense ferociously attacked the credibility of many of the state's witnesses including Osborne, Driscoll reminded the jury that the only person on trial was Abdi.

"Is Billy on trial for defending himself against this home invader?" he demanded. "Billy Osborne's not on trial for that."

Driscoll also attacked the defense contention that the most likely person to have shot Putnam was John Perry II, who was inside the trailer, and who left before police arrived, allegedly taking with him a 9mm handgun "“ the type of gun that killed Putnam. Perry is charged with perjury and evidence tampering.

However, Driscoll argued, based on the condition of the slug found in Putnam's body, it did not pass through the wall of the trailer before hitting him.

"He couldn't have been killed by a bullet from the trailer," the prosecutor insisted.

Prosecutors also emphasized Abdi's own statements to police after his arrest, in which he admitted having taken a gun to the trailer, with the plan to "rob" (Abdi's word) Osborne.

Defense attorney Isabella Thomas, who along with her husband and co-counsel Larry Thomas represented Abdi, told the jury that the state didn't show that her client had a gun, fired any shots, or planned to rob anyone.

"The wrong person's already been accused, but he's not guilty," she said. She strongly suggested that many of the state's witnesses adapted their stories to what the state wanted to hear, in return for special consideration in their own criminal cases, calling this a "'let's make a deal' situation."

Larry Thomas noted that police found only three shell casings outside the trailer, all apparently from a .22-caliber rifle fired by Boler. Therefore, he argued, it's impossible to show that Abdi ever fired a shot at the dwelling.

"They didn't find any support for any physical shots being fired outside," he declared.