A 21-year-old man has pleaded guilty in the 2022 shooting of a 15-year-old Birmingham boy that left the teen with blindness in one eye and a brain injury.
Derrick Dewayne Greene pleaded guilty to first-degree assault and discharging a firearm into an occupied dwelling, Injured in the shooting was Christian Savage, who is now 17.
A second suspect, 21-year-old Martez Willearl Jefferson, is scheduled for trial in 2025. Jefferson is also awaiting trial on an unrelated capital murder charge and five other felony shooting charges in at least three different incidents in June 2022.
Under the plea agreement, Greene was sentence to 20 years in prison with five to actually serve in the assault conviction, and 10 years with two to serve in the discharging a firearm conviction.
The time to actually serve will run consecutive, which means Greene will spend seven years in prison. The overall sentences, however, will run concurrently.
Greene was booked back into the Jefferson County Jail following Monday’s plea to await transfer to the Alabama Department of Corrections.
“I pray that Derrick uses these years that he will be behind bars to open mindedly reflect on what he stole from Christian as well as everyone who loves him,’’ said Christian’s mother, Patrice Leonard,
“Please don’t take lightly the fact that forgiveness, grace and mercy played a huge party in your sentencing,’’ Leonard said.
Christian Savage, 15, left Children’s Hospital Friday, Oct. 14, more than 100 days after he was shot in the head while playing video games inside his Birmingham home. (Carol Robinson)
Christian was shot in the head June 29, 2022, while playing video games in the second-floor bedroom of the family’s apartment at The Rev. Dr. Morrell Todd Homes in Birmingham’s Kingston community. Prior to the shooting, he was point guard on the Woodlawn High School basketball team.
Thirteen shell casings were recovered from the crime scene. Witnesses provided police with a suspect vehicle.
The bullet that struck Christian traveled from the right side of his face to the left side and lodged near his brain. Christian left Children’s of Alabama on Oct. 14, 2022. He had been hospitalized for more than 100 days.
He now attends another Birmingham high school.
