UPDATE: Sylvester Ford has been sentenced to 50 years for the 2020 murder of his uncle, Devon Ford.
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INDIANAPOLIS – After a three-day trial, a jury convicted a man of murdering his uncle.
Sylvester Ford was 16 years old when he shot and killed Devon Ford in February 2020. His case was waived to adult court, where he was charged with murder.
On Feb. 16, 2020, officers with the Beech Grove Police Department were dispatched to an apartment in the 100 block of Diplomat Court for a reported shooting.
Officers encountered Sylvester Ford, who told them his uncle had been shot. Ford led officers to his uncle’s apartment where police found Devon Ford suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Sylvester Ford initially told family members that he’d left the apartment to take out the trash when five people wearing masks ran upstairs and shot his uncle. But his accounts of the shooting varied and had inconsistencies, police said.
Instead of contacting police immediately after the shooting, he first sought out family members, telling police his “instinct was to call my people,” according to court documents.
He put the gun used in the shooting in a backpack and got rid of it. Police later located the weapon and some magazines in a dumpster behind a Burger King.
During an interview with investigators, Sylvester Ford said he’d been living with his uncle for a short time after being incarcerated. The two had been arguing in the days before the shooting, with his uncle having taken away an iPad because his nephew was using it too much.
Ford also tried to pin the shooting on someone named “Jerron.” However, he eventually told police he shot his uncle three times, stating that he just “kept going because I did not know how to stop.”
Sentencing is scheduled for March 1, 2023.
