By Joe Johnson
A teenage Athens boy who was arrested for murder in May after he fatally shot a man at a neighborhood block party was recently indicted on lesser charges of manslaughter.
Marquise Dontavius Malcom, 15, was arrested on May 9, the day after he reportedly shot and killed 38-year-old Carlos Harper during a block party on Carriage Court in the Clarke Gardens apartment complex located off Barnett Shoals Road.
According to Athens-Clarke County police, Malcom reportedly shot Harper after Harper confronted him over something inappropriate the teen might have said or done to the victim’s daughter during the party.
When arrested, police initially charged the teen with felony murder, aggravated assault, possession of a firearm by a person under 18, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime.
According to Clarke County Superior Court records, the case was presented Aug. 3 to a grand jury, which returned an indictment charging Malcom with voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter, aggravated assault, possession of a firearm by a person under 18, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony.
The indictment the DA’s office presented did not give grand jurors the option of voting on murder charges.
It states that Malcom was charged with voluntary manslaughter because he killed Harper “under such circumstances that would otherwise be murder while acting solely as the result of a sudden, violent and irresistible passion resulting from serious provocation sufficient to excite such passion in a reasonable person by shooting Carlos Harper...”
In charging the teen with involuntary manslaughter, the indictment states that Malcom did not intentionally cause Harper’s death.
Malcom, who is incarcerated at the Rockdale Regional Youth Detention Center, is scheduled to be arraigned on Aug. 18.