A mass shooting left a teen girl dead. 1 man will serve 10 years for her death: 'It’s unjust' (2024)

One of the men arrested in a gang shootout that left more than a dozen bystanders wounded and killed an innocent 14-year-old girl pleaded guilty on June 3. His sentence: 10 years in prison.

Tyquan Cooper, 23, was one of four men charged in the mass shooting that tore through an end of school concert in North Charleston’s Deas Hill community on May 22, 2021. At the time, Cooper was free on bond set for charges filed in another shooting.

Cooper appeared virtually in Charleston County Circuit Court on June 3, wearing a bright orange shirt and calling in from the state Department of Corrections, where he is currently serving a 20-year sentence for that unrelated violent crime a jury convicted him of last year.

He was out on bond from that case when he and another member of the Rollin 20’s Crips street gang exchanged shots with two members of the rival Bloods street gang, according to court documents. Charges are still pending for the other men.

The shooting left 14-year-old Ronjanae Smith dead. She and Cooper shared a half-sister.

Judge Bentley Price could have sentenced Cooper up to 30 years for voluntary manslaughter. Instead, he imposed the 10-year prison term to be served after he completes his current prison sentence.

“The bottom line is that he will be serving the equivalent of a 30-year sentence, which was the maximum he faced for Ronjanae’s death,” 9th Circuit Solicitor Scarlett Wilson wrote to The Post and Courier after Cooper was sentenced.

But that’s not how Ronjanae Smith’s family sees it.

To them, Cooper will only serve 10 years in prison for contributing to the death of a bright and loving teen whose whole life was ahead of her.

That’s the same number of years her father served for drug-related charges.

“It’s unjust,” her father, Ronald Smith, said after hearing Judge Price’s sentence. “It’s a slap in the face from the system.”

Ronald Smith and Ronjanae Smith’s mother, Katrina Sinclair, used their pain to found a nonprofit dedicated to stopping gun violence in her name.

Ronald Smith still mentors boys on a regular basis, urging them to turn away from violence. He actively tries to defuse situations that could turn deadly and consistently comforts those who have lost loved ones to gun violence.

He fights for others so they don’t have to experience his pain, he told Price in court. But sentencing Cooper for 10 additional years for killing his daughter discredits his efforts, he said.

“It’s going against everything that we’re fighting for. What are we doing? Why are the drug dealers getting more time than the murderers?” he asked. “I served 10 years for drugs. And this guy just took a body and got 10 years.”

The sentencing shows cracks in a broken system, he said.

And he now worries the other three people charged in relation to the mass shooting — Manqual Horlbeck Jr., Tye Robinson Jr. and Malachi Wigfall — will get lesser sentences as a result of Cooper’s plea.

Assistant Solicitor Stephanie Lindor, who has the cases against Horlbeck, Robinson and Wigfall as well, declined to comment on their pending cases.

“Black on Black crime, we’re killing each other, and they’re not doing anything about it,” Ronald Smith said.

Ronjanae Smith’s mother and other six family members who appeared in court feel the same way.

“Justice was not served today,” one of Ronjanae Smith’s grandmothers, Betty McFadden, told The Post and Courier.

Price’s time on the bench is winding down.

The state Judicial Merit Selection Commission found him unqualified in a split vote last November, rendering him unable to complete a reelection bid. He will vacate his seat at the end of the month.

His peers previously found him unqualified in reputation in an anonymous survey administered by the state bar’s Judicial Qualification Committee.

Critics have levied accusations that Price grants lenient bonds to repeat violent offenders who are represented by defense attorneys he is friends with.

He responded to those accusations during a fall hearing, saying he takes victims’ positions seriously in all cases.

“My philosophy on sentencing is the same for almost every sentence. I want to make it incentive-based for the defendant to do the right thing,” Price previously said.

His term expires June 30.

He will oversee this week’s plea docket in Charleston, which is swarming with defendants pleading guilty to murder and other violent charges, like Cooper’s voluntary manslaughter plea.

He’ll conclude his time on the bench by overseeing civil trials in Berkeley County during the last week of June.