Published: May 15, 2008 10:33 pm      

Campbell gets 2 years for having cocaine in jail

No mention of murders

Wearing an orange Lincoln County Jail jumpsuit, Jamarkos Campbell was escorted Thursday into the Madison Circuit courtroom to smiles of more than a dozen friends and family members.

Sentencing on a Madison County felony promoting contraband charge for Campbell, 23, of Orange Street, was scheduled before he turned himself in last month in connection with a pair of 2002 Lincoln County murders. Campbell has been lodged in the Lincoln County Jail ever since.

No mention of the murder case was made during Campbell’s sentencing. Represented by Lexington attorney Ed Cooley, Campbell stood before Madison Circuit Judge Julia Hylton Adams and said he had nothing to say about the charges before he was sentenced.

After making a few corrections on Campbell’s pre-sentence investigation report, Cooley asked only that Campbell be sentenced as recommended by the commonwealth. Adams did impose the two-year sentence and waived Campbell’s court costs.

Campbell was indicted in October 2007 for promoting contraband in the Madison County Detention Center in August 2006, when he “as an inmate in the (MCDC), knowingly possessed dangerous contraband,” the indictment states. The contraband was a bag of cocaine.

The grand jury initially indicted Campbell for first-degree possession of a controlled substance — the cocaine — the promoting contraband charge, and being a second-degree persistent felony offender. The possession charge was dismissed after Cooley made a motion to that effect, citing that the act of possession was the same act of possession in the promoting contraband charge.

The persistent felony offender also later was dismissed.

Campbell was driven last month by an immediate family member to the Richmond Kentucky State Police Post 7 to turn himself in to authorities in connection with the murders of Ryan Shangraw, 20, and Harold “Bo” Upton III, 18, the relative told the Richmond Register previously. Kentucky State Police officials, who are investigating the murders, have not said how Campbell is connected with the boys’ deaths.

KSP officials did send out a press release the day after Campbell turned himself in stating that an arrest of one suspect had been made in connection with the Feb. 1, 2002, murders. However, it stated the investigation was ongoing and no further details would be released at the time. It also indicated that more arrests were expected.

KSP Post Commander Eddie Johnson previously said information about the arrest was not being released because it was made under a juvenile petition and the case still is being investigated.

Thursday, Johnson said there still are no details to be released at this time.

“We are still trying to track down leads,” he said. “There is really nothing newsworthy to release.”

Campbell would have been 17 at the time of the murders.

According to the Post 7 Cold Cases Web site, Shangraw and Upton, both of Stanford, were found shot to death at about 10:30 p.m. at a mobile home on Hubble Road. The report states that the residence is about four miles north of Stanford in Lincoln County.

The Lincoln County case had been cold for six years until Campbell turned himself in. It is not clear how Campbell may have been involved or if he just has information about the murders.

In other, unrelated Circuit Court news:

• The attorney for Edmonson County Sheriff B.J. Honeycutt has filed a motion for a change of venue for Honeycutt’s misrepresentation case. Honeycutt, 47, of Park City is charged with 13 counts of misrepresentation of having conducted training courses and four counts of providing incomplete firearms training.

No reason was given in open court for the request. Adams continued the case to July 3 to allow the commonwealth time to respond to the defense motion.

• A July 7 trial date was set for Eastern Kentucky University student Dotlene Bonner, 20, of EKU’s Telford Hall. Bonner is charged with two counts of trafficking in a controlled substance, cocaine.