They immediately believed that this was not random, that this was an intentional killing, that Lamont was the victim of someone who wanted him dead.
When somebody says they want him knocked off, what do you mean?
What do you take that to mean?
Lamont is dead.
He wants him dead.
I'm Scott Weinberger, investigative journalist and former deputy sheriff.
I'm Anastasia Nicolazzi, former New York City homicide prosecutor and host of Investigation.
Discovery's True Conviction.
And this is Anatomy of Murders.
Sometimes, complex cases start with something simple.
A strange comment, a phone call, a random object left at the scene.
One clue leads to another, and soon the whole case unravels, revealing a story more layered and troubling than anyone imagined.
That's what happened with today's case, which started with a simple knock at the door.
It was January 18, 2017.
A new year full of promise and possibility had just begun for Lamont Baldwin, a father of four in Henrico County, Virginia.
Lamont was upstairs watching TV with his wife.
Someone knocked at their front door, and the couple's teenage daughter answered.
It was a woman asking for Mont, which was Lamont's nickname.
Lamont came down the stairs and saw the female at the door and said, do I know you?
That's the voice of Matthew Ackley, a deputy Commonwealth attorney in Henrico County, Virginia.
Whether or not Lamont knew the woman at the door quickly became irrelevant.
Lamont's daughter said that she heard the female say, yeah.
And right after that, there was a hail of gunfire.
Lamont was just outside the door.
The gunshots stopped as suddenly as they started, and then there was silence.
Lamont's wife looked outside and saw her husband lying on the ground and their daughter then turned to dial 911.
They shot my dad.
Somebody is shot.
Please, Harry.
Please.
Ma'am, is he inside the house or is he outside?
My mom is trying to get him.
Please, Harry.
Ma'am, is he awake?
Is he breathing?
No.
Oh, I don't know.
He just laid down outside.
Please, Harry.
The operator tried to get more information about what happened, so Lamont's daughter passed the phone to her mom.
We were laying in the bed watching a movie, and someone rung the doorbell, and it was a female.
Was she a white female, black female?
What was she wearing?
Lamont's wife said she didn't know Akisha, and as far as she knew, neither did Lamont.
Please hurry.
The operator asked if the woman who'd come to the door was the shooter, but neither Lamont's wife or daughter knew.
As soon as he was being shot, his wife closed the door behind him to try to shield herself and the daughter from the gunshots.
As the operator continued to ask questions, Lamont's daughter can be heard in the background begging for her dad to be okay.
Now, we've chosen not to play that portion of the call.
It is disturbing.
Within minutes, an ambulance arrived at the home, but it was too late for Lamont.
He was declared deceased at the scene.
He had multiple traumatic gunshot wounds that would have immediately caused incapacitation and death.
I don't believe he was even transported to the hospital.
And anesthesia, as you know, trauma doesn't just occur in a moment.
It can embed itself in someone's memory and can be extremely difficult to escape.
In this case, we're not talking about anybody.
We're talking about a teenager, which could devastate their sense of security and also potentially plant these haunting images that follow them for the rest of their life.
And I think that's actually it.
Obviously reeling from the loss of one's loved one to homicide.
Well, I mean, that is pain that no one should have to bear.
So you just know how painful that is.
But to actually be there, see it be there at the time that it's happening.
It is, as you're saying, exactly that.
It's a whole nother level of trauma.
And so once the first officers on scene cordoned off the area, they notified detectives in the homicide unit, who then in turn reached out to Matthews.
They'll call me as soon as they get called out and let me know that a homicide has happened and what the initial stage of the investigation shows.
And then if there are any legal questions about obtaining warrants or search warrants or anything like that,
I remember when I got the call, it was that the victim's daughter had called 911 and essentially said that my father was just shot dead in front of us in the doorway of our house.
Getting calls like that in the middle of the night are not uncommon for homicide prosecutors.
We worked together with law enforcement from the very beginning as the legal arm of the investigation.
And as Matthew got the details of what had occurred, the crime scene was still being processed.
Witnesses were still being interviewed, which included Lamont's wife and her daughter.
They both related the same general story of the daughter answering the door, the person asking for Mont and Lamont and his wife coming down the stairs and what happened at the door.
The daughter and the wife.
Both did not recognize the female and they could not see who the people were who were shooting.
So that was about the limit of the information they had.
Investigators' first priority was finding the woman who'd come to the house.
Whether she was the shooter or had just set the shooting in motion by getting Lamont outside.
Investigators didn't yet know, but they knew they needed to find out.
As part of the detectives' initial canvas of the area, they spoke to neighbors and they quickly learned that one neighbor did have important information, details which would become the case's first potential lead.
There was a neighbor who said that they saw about four people running to a dark-colored sedan right after the shooting and the sedan pulled away quickly.
No description other than four shadowy figures running to a vehicle.
The vague descriptions left open a lot of possibilities.
But one thing was clear.
The woman at the door had asked for Lamont by name, so his assailants knew exactly who they were looking for.
They immediately believed that this was not random, that this was an intentional killing, that Lamont was the victim of someone who wanted him dead.
And knowing that investigators began to look closely at Lamont's life and the people that he interacted with.
The first questions that the investigators would ask the family is do you know of anybody who has an ongoing beef with Lamont?
Is there somebody who would want to hurt him?
Has he had any recent disagreements with anyone?
Lamont's wife described him as calm and a steady presence for their four children.
She said his community ties ran deep and that people often turned to him when there was a conflict that needed resolving.
But there was more about Lamont Baldwin.
He was already known to law enforcement.
He had had many run-ins with the law over the years, primarily in drug context.
He was known as a distributor of primarily cocaine in the Henrico area.
And it wasn't that surprising that this information was not something Lamont's family really wanted to share.
There's a hesitancy for family members.
Most of the time they know that their family member is involved in the drug trade.
At least the spouse or significant other typically knows that.
But they will be hesitant to disclose information that they know about that to law enforcement.
But any information about a homicide victim could be useful as you begin building a snapshot of your victim, developing potential theories.
And, with this new information, the circles he was allegedly running in.
It's definitely something they needed to consider as a possible motive for the shooting.
As we see a lot of times, drug distribution is a dangerous occupation.
You are subject to being robbed, subject to home break-ins, subject to revenge for disgruntled clients and disgruntled suppliers, and that those disagreements often cannot be addressed through legitimate means and therefore they are usually addressed through violence.
So that was the initial suspicion of what had happened here.
But even if it was narcotics-related, there were still multiple possibilities.
Initially, there's some suspicion that maybe this was a hit for someone thinking that he was cooperating against them.
Oftentimes, when people are arrested and Lamont had been arrested multiple times in the past there's a suspicion that well, they might be providing information to the police.
And so it would be a way to silence potential cooperators.
So that was certainly a one of the potential theories of why he was killed.
While police looked for clues as to motive, physical evidence from the crime scene was also still being collected.
They found nine, I believe, cartridge cases fired from a semi-automatic pistol in the front yard right in front of Mr Baldwin's home.
And then there was a cell phone found in the yard.
Now, it could have been just dropped there randomly by someone else totally uninvolved in this case.
That was certainly a possibility.
Investigators showed the phone to Lamont's wife, who said it was not her husband's.
He had a phone in the townhouse, which was turned over by his wife and daughter.
And there was no indication that he had been outside or that anybody had run right up to him at the time of his shooting.
So they were pretty sure that this phone wasn't his.
Getting into a locked cell phone usually isn't a walk in the park.
Depending on the model and the security level.
Even with a warrant, detectives could still hit a wall.
But investigators here caught a break.
This phone was a simple flip phone with no passcode or encryption, making all its content accessible.
They quickly processed and surveyed the phone, and one thing immediately stood out.
When that cell phone was processed, it had photos on it that appeared to show someone with a large wad of currency and a black pistol handle hanging out of his pocket.
And when they looked at the timestamp it felt even more likely that the phone was a major lead, because the image of the man with the money and the gun was taken just one night before Lamont was murdered.
In the investigation into the brutal murder of Lamont Baldwin, investigators turned their focus to the cell phone recovered from the crime scene.
There were several clues that tied images recovered on the cell phone to the murder of Lamont Baldwin, the first being a gun.
But was it the murder weapon?
I can't tell that it matches the cartridge cases, of course, but they can tell that it's a semi-automatic pistol, which would be consistent with what was used in the homicide.
There was also location data obtained which signaled where the pictures had been taken at a hotel right near Lamont's home.
They were able to determine that that phone had traveled to a Best Western hotel in Henrico County.
And they went to that hotel and were able to determine that the photographs that were on the phone of the person with the wad of money and the gun were taken from a room inside that hotel.
The cell phone itself gave investigators other important intel, like the digital copy of a bus ticket which had departed only a few days before the murder.
The return ticket was the day after Lamont was killed.
Suspicious timing, to say the least, especially when you factored in the route location round trip from Atlanta, Georgia to Henrico County.
That wasn't the only information tying the phone and its likely owner to the Georgia city.
The investigators found that the phone number and most of the phone numbers in the phone were linked to the Atlanta area code.
And so they suspected that the killer or people associated with the killer might be from Atlanta.
Investigators in Henrico were familiar with Atlanta in ways beyond it being a wonderful southern city.
They were often tasked with narcotics cases that connected Atlanta to their county.
The clues from the phone supported investigators' initial theory that Lamont's murder may very well be connected to the drug trade.
They reached out to Atlanta police for assistance and the local authorities gave them their next break.
They would have been able to supply the phone number and that photo to Atlanta police.
And through Atlanta's police database, they were able to develop the name of Antonio Johnson.
Johnson had a prior record for firearms possession and was also known to have connections in the drug trade.
He went by the nickname Rampage, which just happened to be the name on the phone.
That was apparently how he was known in his circle of associates in Atlanta.
And the phone was named Rampage J's phone.
So they were able to pretty well determine that that was certainly Antonio Johnson's.
Police now had Johnson connected to the phone found outside Lamont's home and they had evidence of a round trip from Atlanta to Henrico right before and after the murder.
There was also location data placing the phone in Henrico County.
At the very same time, Lamont was shot.
And so really the question there is what do all these various pieces make?
You know, how much of the puzzle is it?
Is it enough for them to bring him in?
Like obviously we talk about these circumstantial pieces and you really just have to look about.
Like okay, individually do they mean much?
Probably not.
But what about when you take them all together?
I mean, you're looking at the drug trade and how they operate their business and obviously cell phones are a key part of how they communicate to each other, whether it's texts or calls or whatever else it may be.
But it also helps ID a potential suspect.
And while it's way too early to see how much it's going to pay off, you know it's going to be worth spending the time to chase down those leads and really step up the pressure.
And I think authorities in Henrico would agree with me when I say that it wasn't the strongest of cases but that when they put it together all the pieces, they decided it was enough to bring Johnson in.
He was arrested by Atlanta police detectives and was taken to Atlanta homicide headquarters.
When he got there, the detectives from Henrico sat down with Antonio and explained his rights and attempted to interview him.
Investigators already had some evidence, but would it be enough to convince a jury?
Or even if convicted, what about an appeals court?
A statement could prove invaluable and also further strengthen their case.
They had to be strategic about what they revealed to Johnson and when.
It was a calculated exchange that could make all the difference between Johnson coming clean or shutting down altogether.
So Johnson agreed to speak with detectives.
They began with open-ended questions, as we often do, but his answers were very vague and he wasn't really giving much.
So they determined right at that moment they were going to change tact.
They showed Johnson the pictures they had of him in the hotel room, posing with money and a gun.
And to their surprise, Johnson didn't deny it was him.
He even admitted that he had been in Henrico the night before the murder.
He wouldn't say more than that.
So investigators chose to up the ante by revealing that they located crucial evidence connecting him to the murder scene his cell phone in the yard of Lamont's home.
He later admitted that he was there when they confronted him with the fact that they had found his cell phone at the scene, but said I didn't kill anybody.
I wasn't the trigger man.
Admit what you have to, deny what you can.
But at that point, Johnson wouldn't say anything more, so they decided it was time for a break.
The investigators offered for Mr. Johnson to have a cigarette.
And so the Atlanta detectives took him out into a little outside area of the police department to smoke a cigarette.
One of the detectives from Atlanta, David Quinn, took Johnson outside and he smoked a cigarette while they both chatted.
Detective Quinn's ability to put Johnson at ease would pay dividends.
They try to teach police how to interview, and there are certainly techniques.
But, just like in any walk of life, how you relate to people, I think is a skill that is in many ways innate.
And he had it.
And as they spoke, a recorder was rolling in the detective's pocket.
Quinn had grown up in Atlanta and in similar circumstances as Mr Johnson and was able to really develop a good rapport with him.
What happened next surprised even Quinn.
Johnson said that not only was he at Lamont's house during the murder, he was the person who fired the gun.
And his story didn't end there.
When they returned from the cigarette break, Johnson went on to say that the crime was bigger than just himself.
He was merely a hired hitman.
He did not know Lamont Baldwin personally.
He was told that the person's name was Mont, but he was taken to that location by people who did know Lamont.
According to Johnson, the person who orchestrated the murder was a man named Derek Lawrence.
Now, in a moment, you'll hear audio from that part of the interview.
But as it happens, the quality isn't great, but we still think it's worth letting you hear it.
Johnson laid out in detail each step that led up to the killing.
A few days before he had met up with Lawrence, who showed him a picture of Lamont and gave him a gun.
Did he give you anything else while you were there?
No.
What kind of gun was it?
It was a Glock.
It was a Glock?
10mm Glock.
10mm Glock?
No.
Do you know what kind of rounds were inside?
40.
Johnson said that he was joined by another man, an acquaintance of Lawrence, a man named Santonio Brown.
They traveled from Atlanta to Henrico and stayed at a hotel.
And that's where those cell phone pictures were taken.
And Johnson kept on talking.
He went on to say that the next day they drove to Lamont's house.
Johnson couldn't provide many details about the woman who'd knocked at the front door, but he did talk about shooting Lamont.
Right after the murder, Johnson and Brown fled back to Atlanta.
And it didn't take them long to realize just how big of a mistake they'd made.
When they all got back to Atlanta, they went to Derek Lawrence's house and everyone realized that Antonio Johnson had dropped his phone at the scene.
So there was a lot of concern over whether or not police were going to be able to piece this thing together.
The group still attempted to cover their tracks, starting with the murder weapon.
What did you do with the gun when you got back here?
He got it from me.
He took it from you?
No, I didn't.
The gun that was used was a Glock, and it has parts that can be altered.
Glock handles for want of a better word are made with a kind of a plastic composite, and it can be melted under extreme heat.
So they were using a torch in the garage on the garage floor to try to burn the gun.
Once they semi-destroyed the gun, they took it apart and threw the parts away in various places.
Johnson also told detectives what they were supposed to get paid.
In return for killing Lamont Baldwin, Johnson and Brown had been promised 4000, half in cash and half in narcotics.
When the interview finished, Johnson was processed and taken to jail to await arraignment.
The detectives began the tedious work of attempting to corroborate or to poke holes in his statement.
It had revealed a plot that crossed state lines and involved drugs, payouts and multiple participants.
So they had their work cut out for them.
Turning back to digital evidence, they began to look more closely and then discovered messages from Derek Lawrence to Johnson.
There were messages like, I want it to be now or I want it to be tonight, something like that.
They traced the number back to Lawrence, who Johnson had already said orchestrated Lamont's murder.
It turned out that Lawrence was also known to police for his role in the Atlanta narcotics trade.
There were connections to Derek Lawrence that were able to get the law enforcement assistance in Atlanta to be able to develop a case on Derek Lawrence.
I think they already had an investigation open and were aware of Derek Lawrence's activities.
It was becoming more and more clear that Lamont's murder was somehow connected to narcotics.
But there was one major piece missing, a motive.
Why did Lawrence want Lamont dead?
It was a question they weren't expecting to get from Lawrence, at least not yet.
So they turned their focus to the other co-conspirator, who Johnson had already named Santonio Brown.
And just like Johnson, Brown was also already known to police.
Investigators keep records of known associates of drug dealers.
It can sometimes point in certain directions as to you know who was part of Lamont Baldwin's network.
Police knew that Brown frequently went from Atlanta to Virginia, transporting illegal narcotics.
And that's where they found his connection to Lamont and to Lawrence.
His role was to bring the drugs up to Lamont and then bring the money back to Derek Lawrence.
Police had enough information to secure a warrant for Brown for being an accessory to Lamont's murder.
He was arrested and they hoped he'd agree to be interviewed.
And talk he did.
He was forthcoming, said, I knew you all were looking for me.
I was there when this all happened.
Brown said that he worked for Derek Lawrence and was also supposed to be paid for his role in helping to murder Lamont.
Antonio Brown kept talking and soon revealed what investigators had been waiting for.
Why Derek Lawrence had wanted Lamont Baldwin dead.
Police sat down to interview Santonio Brown, who was suspected as being part of the murder of Lamont Baldwin.
It didn't take long before he began to talk about the events leading to the crime.
Brown said that Lamont was murdered over a debt owed to Derek Lawrence, one that supposedly stemmed from a shipment of cocaine.
The debt equaled a large sum of money, $20,000.
Lamont had told Lawrence that he didn't have the money he owed because it had been stolen from his house in a burglary.
He knew about the story that Lamont had, provided that my house got broken into and this money was stolen.
That's why I'm slow in paying you back.
And that Derek Lawrence didn't really believe that.
That part of Brown's story was corroborated because one month before Lamont was killed he had reported the burglary to police and the report was still on file.
Interestingly, the police did take a B&E call from Lamont Baldwin back on December 2nd of 2016.
So about a month and a half before this incident, his house had been broken into.
And it's likely that that money had been stolen because Mr Baldwin had a safe in the home and it was open.
While Lamont had called police and showed them an open safe, he hadn't reported the large sum of money that had been taken.
That isn't exactly surprising if it was obtained from narcotics sales or was to be payment for the same.
But it did seem that the theft had taken place.
Brown went on to tell police that, as part of Lawrence's original plan, Brown was supposed to approach Lamont and ask him for the money he owed Lawrence.
I think the initial thought was that maybe he would be able to get Lamont to give up the 20000 and that then Lamont wouldn't have to be killed.
But that isn't what ended up happening, obviously.
Instead, Lawrence put together a small team to orchestrate Lamont's murder.
Brown told police he was against the plan, but admitted that he did participate.
So this is what he told police.
That was part of my falling out with Derek Lawrence was I didn't think it was right that they were going to kill Lamont.
And I didn't want to be a part of that part of this.
We're not sure how much of that is how he honestly felt, but that is what he said.
Brown's feelings about the hit may have been because Lamont and Lawrence weren't just business associates.
They had been friends.
They were longtime friends, I believe childhood friends.
So they had known each other for many, many years.
The new information that Lamont had been killed by a childhood friend added another layer of depravity to the case.
Santonio Brown was charged with conspiracy to commit murder.
He was extradited from Atlanta back to Henrico County to await trial.
So investigators now had two statements and phone records implicating Derek Lawrence as the person who ordered and orchestrated Lamont Baldwin's murder.
As they worked to build their case against Lawrence Henrico, investigators once again turned to their Georgia counterparts.
So they again asked for assistance from Atlanta.
Both Atlanta police and ATF were willing to assist in the investigation into Derek Lawrence.
Because of Derek Lawrence's involvement in running this drug organization, they were hopeful that they would be able to seek justice on that end as well.
Based on the evidence they had already obtained, police were able to secure a warrant to search Lawrence's home.
Among the things they were looking for were corroboration of the story about the burning of the gun, possibly finding the murder weapon there, which
Ultimately, they didn't.
But during the course of that search warrant at Derek Lawrence's house they found drugs and several other guns, including a machine gun type weapon that had a drum magazine.
While they didn't find anything directly connecting Lawrence to Lamont's murder, they did find two rifles and hundreds of rounds of ammunition and cocaine.
Lawrence had prior felony convictions, which included robbery, assault and possessing controlled substances with the intent to distribute.
And because of that, he was not allowed to have any weapons.
So, following the search, Lawrence was arrested and charged with weapon possessions and likely, based upon the amount of cocaine recovered, narcotics distribution.
The three men suspected of being responsible for Lamont Baldwin's murder were now all in custody.
Antonio Johnson and Santonio Brown for their roles in the murder and Derek Lawrence for the items found in his home during the police search.
Justice for Lamont Baldwin seemed to be getting closer, but prosecutors now had to think about the trial.
As a lead prosecutor.
One of the first things on Matthew's mind was if Johnson and Brown would be tried separately or together.
If they had both decided to go to trial, we probably would not have been able to try them together, because we would have needed to introduce their statements against them.
And if you have a joint trial, then there are constitutional issues with trying to introduce one defendant's statement that implicates the other, because obviously they wouldn't then be able to cross-examine the statement itself.
And you know.
Normally just to put it very plainly for judicial economy and because it's easier on witnesses, prosecutors defense everyone.
You usually will try defendants together if they're all charged with the same case.
However, you know, in certain circumstances, you need separate juries.
For example, like here when you have two statements, because as many of you, most of you probably know, you can't consider statements of a co-defendant against the other.
Why?
Because you can't cross-examine.
A statement.
So either you would do a double jury trial, which is how I tried quite a number of cases back in Brooklyn, or you do separate trials.
And that's the more common route, and a lot of courts won't even entertain double juries.
So then, like here, it'll be two trials if both go that route.
It was decided that each defendant would be tried separately.
The supposed trigger man, Antonio Johnson, would be tried first.
The case against him centered on the admissions he made during the police interview and the phone data.
It would also be supported by the testimony of his co-defendant, now-turned-cooperator, Santonio Brown.
He agreed to plead guilty to a lesser charge of covering up Lamont's murder in exchange for testifying against Johnson.
But even with the amount of evidence that had been gathered, the case was not without its challenges.
We didn't have any eyewitness who was going to say that they watched Antonio Johnson fire the gun.
We did have Antonio Johnson's confession, but we knew that at trial he would try to back away from that confession, either by argument or by testimony.
And that's exactly what the defense did before the trial began.
They also filed a motion to suppress his confession based on that, the Atlanta detectives essentially were too good at convincing him to talk to them.
And the argument was that they were coercive in how they interviewed Mr Johnson while he was smoking a cigarette.
Suppression motions for things like statements, identifications and evidence collected are pretty standard.
They're hearings done usually before the trial.
And that's because, even though the prosecution has it, they need to show the court that it was legally and appropriately obtained.
But that wasn't all the defense tried to suppress.
They tried to stop the prosecution from introducing one of the most important pieces of evidence in the case Johnson's cell phone, the one that was recovered outside of Lamont Baldwin's house.
They attempted to suppress our evidence that we obtained from the phone, alleging that Antonio Johnson had a privacy interest in that phone that was left there inadvertently.
So digital forensics like information off of a cell phone has become a really useful tool, especially in homicide investigation.
So if you have the opportunity to get it, you have to make sure you're able to use it.
Otherwise, the work is useless or even worse, could collapse a prosecution down the road.
So do it right.
That's the whole point.
Before law enforcement can look through someone's phone, they really need someone's permission or get a proper search warrant.
Courts expect a warrant to be backed by specific reasons, like linking that phone to the crime.
And you know normally obviously, people have a right to privacy with things that they own and that belong to them or their homes.
But, you know, there are certain circumstances that you no longer have the right to that privacy.
And that is like here, abandoned property is exactly one like that.
You know, you have no right to privacy to things that are abandoned.
And remember, police found that cell phone just sitting out in a yard.
And Matthew was confident that his argument that the phone was indeed abandoned property would win out in the end.
I felt that we would have a pretty good argument that even if he still had a privacy interest, then if the police find that item, they've got to have some way to try to determine whose it is so that they could give it back to them.
And since there was no password, the phone wasn't really privacy protected anyway.
The judge ruled that both the confession and the cell phone were legally obtained and could be introduced into evidence at the trial.
There was still something else that Matthew had to think about and factor into his case.
It had to do with the role narcotics played into the likely motive for Lamont's murder.
The jury may not like what they were going to hear about the motive or about Lamont and the defense ties to narcotics trafficking.
Matthew needed to make sure that it didn't cloud their judgment and that the jurors kept an open mind.
And look, it's a type of thing prosecutors have to think about.
I always believed in confronting all angles of my case and being direct with the jury.
And here, Matthew seemed to think similarly.
And clearly, his skill and experience served the case well.
In my career, I've had the good fortune to be trained in prosecuting homicide cases where the victim is not squeaky clean and is not going to be someone who the jury might want to invite over to dinner.
Lamont Baldwin was not living the cleanest life, but he deserves justice for an act of violence that occurs to him just as anyone does.
The trial against Antonio Johnson began the year after Lamont Baldwin's murder.
Matthew went into it feeling confident.
A lot of times when we go to trial we're at least I am not always 100 confident that a jury will see it the same way I do.
But I remember going into this trial and just being very confident that I don't see any other way to view all of this evidence.
Matthew laid out the hard facts the murder, the investigation, the cell phone dumped outside of Lamont's home and the digital gold mine buried inside.
That trove of data wasn't just evidence, it was the fire that could ignite the case.
What struck me about this case was how fortunate we were with the initial crime scene investigation, finding that cell phone.
I don't know if we would have figured this case out without that cell phone.
A significant amount of time at the trial was spent on Johnson's statement.
Atlanta's Detective Quinn took the stand and explained how he and Johnson quickly developed a comfortable rapport and that led to his admissions.
Detective Quinn's straight talk, unfiltered honesty, seemed to resonate with the jurors.
Detective Quinn said, I went to the University of the Streets.
And so he was just a fantastic witness who the jury loved.
And he was able to explain.
Look, I was able to relate to Mr Johnson on a personal level in a way that maybe the detectives from Henrico couldn't.
He felt that he could confide in me what he had done.
And that's what happened in here.
And there was something else that Matthew was also able to present to the jury, that was discussed during Johnson's statement, and that was Johnson's face itself, more specifically, one of his tattoos.
On the day he was arrested and interviewed, police had noticed a fresh tattoo under Johnson's eye in the shape of a teardrop.
He had other teardrops around his eyes which the tattoo and homicide experts will tell you is typically for a completed homicide, kind of a mark that you have killed someone.
But there was a fresh tattoo when he was arrested that was still weeping.
So he had just gotten that tattoo within weeks of when the police were there.
It was something that Johnson hadn't tried to deny during his interview.
In all honesty, how many people do you think you've killed?
One, two, three?
You got three solid teardrops.
When they're filled in, that means they're dead, right?
So it looks to me like you've got three on your right eye and one on your left eye.
So have you killed four people before?
Legit?
When Lamont's teenage daughter took the stand and described watching her father killed right before her eyes, the emotional weight became impossible to ignore.
It cut straight to the heart of what this crime cost.
Our questions for her were very short.
Just, you know, tell us what happened at the front door.
And she did a great job.
It was a reminder that whatever Lamont's business might have been, he was still a human being.
He was a man with a daughter and family who loved him and had lost him to gun violence.
Justice and the law is supposed to be the same for us all.
It brought it on a very human level to make the jury understand that you know, no matter what Lamont Baldwin was involved in, he didn't deserve this and his family certainly didn't deserve to be put through this.
The evidence was strong and now there was hope that Lamont and his family might finally get justice.
There were a lot of pieces that came together really well for us in this case and there was so much evidence that corroborated other parts of the evidence that really made this case a pleasure to put on as a trial.
The jury returned their verdict within hours.
Antonio Johnson was convicted of first-degree murder and use of a firearm.
At the time in Virginia, we had jury recommended sentences.
So at that point, we would be able to put on evidence of Mr. Johnson's prior convictions.
And once they received all that information as well, they recommended a life sentence.
And that's what the judge ultimately imposed.
And finally, there was Derek Lawrence.
He was tried and convicted for the narcotics and firearms found in his home.
He was sentenced to 16 and a half years in prison, followed by three years of supervised release.
He was convicted in...
Atlanta in federal court.
I looked him up in the Bureau of Prisons and his release date is not until 2031.
So he did receive a significant sentence and he is serving that at this time.
Lawrence was never tried for the murder of Lamont Baldwin.
It was a tricky case, but prosecutors and investigators pushed it over the line.
Justice served.
What won't fade is the fallout.
Lamont Baldwin's murder shattered a family of six, leaving scars his children will carry for life.
And there was tragic irony that Lamont seemed to have been telling the truth about the money being stolen from his home.
But Lawrence still chose to settle their debt with murder.
While solving this twisted plot was no easy feat and well-deserved of recognition, I'd like to also highlight that this is a story about the emptiness a murder leaves behind.
Kids and partners relearning ordinary life.
A violent loss like this one often turns grief into something that doesn't fade on its own.
And children who witness something this horrific can carry real trauma unless they are surrounded with care.
So the point of telling Lamont's story isn't just to mark who is accountable, it's to honor who is left and to steer families towards real help, so healing doesn't get left behind.
At AOM, we believe that all cases are worth discussing, all homicide victims worth remembering.
As I've said before, no matter what you think of a particular person, hopefully someone out there loves them.
They are a wife, a son, a father, brother, or maybe just a friend.
The bottom line, human life is precious.
Lamont Baldwin had a family, a wife children, a daughter who will forever remember the night someone came knocking on their door and that her father soon lay outside their home dead.
I'm sure his family misses him and I hope they are well and are supported as they now navigate life without him.
Tune in next week for another new episode of Anatomy of Murder.
Anatomy of Murder is an AudioChuck original.
Produced and created by Weinberger Media and Fresetti Media.
Ashley Flowers is executive producer.
This episode was written and produced by Walker Lamond.
Researched by Kate Cooper.
Edited by Ali Sirwa and Philjean Grande.
I think Chuck would approve.
