A D.C. man has been found guilty in the murder of a veteran who was shot to death and carjacked at a Maryland gas station.
Demarko Wheeler, 23, was convicted Friday of first-degree murder and armed carjacking in the 2016 attack on 68-year-old Alonzo Jackson.
Authorities say the Marine veteran dropped off his wife at work on the morning of July 20, 2016 and stopped to get gas at a BP station in Capitol Heights, Maryland.
Police say Wheeler, then 20, was wearing a mask when he approached Jackson and shot him. He stole Jackson's 2015 Dodge Charger, which was later found abandoned and burned, they said.
Mary Shields, Jackson's friend and neighbor in southeast D.C., said the car meant the world to her friend.
"That was a prize," she said. "That was like a gift to him for himself, because he thought back in the day he could not afford that car because he was not a college grad."
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Jackson lived his entire life in D.C. and retired after working at Safeway for 30 years. He left behind his wife, three grown sons and grandchildren.
Wheeler, who was arrested days after the killing, faces up to life in prison at his sentencing, which is scheduled for July.
