COLUMBUS – A Columbus man pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court Tuesday in a case involving the murder of a husband and wife in a local Internet café in 2019.
Justice Stringer is accused of being the getaway driver in a string of robberies of Internet gaming businesses, including a holdup at Players Paradise on E. Broad Street in January 2019, where a security guard and his wife were killed, according to a release from the office of Kenneth Parker, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio.
Stringer, 28, pleaded guilty to two counts of robbery, two counts of aiding and abetting murder using a firearm, and one count of brandishing a firearm during a crime of violence, Parker said.
The plea deal includes an agreed-upon sentence of 30 years in prison, Parker said.
Stringer and four others were indicted by a federal grand jury in July 2019 for crimes related to the robberies, including the robbery at Players Paradise, where court documents say Chris King and another defendant robbed the café and allegedly murdered security guard Joseph Arrington and then his wife, Karen, before Stringer drove them away from the scene.
King, 27, is set to begin trial on April 3 on three counts of murder, including the murder of a witness.
Stringer, King and three other defendants were charged in total for an earlier holdup at Players Paradise, as well as a robbery in December 2018 of an internet café on Alum Creek Drive.