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Conviction in 2017 murder results in 75-year sentence

Posted at 6:27 PM, Oct 17, 2019
and last updated 2019-10-17 20:15:35-04

INDIANAPOLIS — A man who was convicted of murder received a 75-year prison sentence.

DeWayne Harris was sentenced for the September 2017 murder of James Butler that occurred outside a house in the 500 block of West 28th St., according to information from the Marion County Prosecutor's Office. Harris will serve 55 years for the murder charge and an additional 20 years for a felony firearm use sentencing enhancement.

Harris was 17 years old at the time of the shooting and charged as an adult.

On Sept. 29, 2017, Butler went to a house on West 28th Street where Harris and three other men were playing dice in the backyard. After a drug transaction, Harris and the others began heckling Butler about not having any stacks of cash, according to a 2017 affidavit. Butler responded by flashing approximately $4,000 in cash.

A witness told police Butler took a phone call and the other men began motioning to each other. Harris followed Butler as he was leaving and placed a handgun against his back.

Shots were exchanged between the two men, and Butler was struck multiple times.

Harris was wearing a GPS monitoring device on the day of the shooting from a criminal case in Jackson County. The prosecutor's office said data from the GPS monitor placed him in the area of the scene at the time of the murder.