Pettigrew sentenced to 20 years in prison for shooting | News, Sports, Jobs

Davonquae J. Pettigrew, 18, was sentenced Friday morning by District Judge Derek Johnson.

Pettigrew pleaded guilty in May to manslaughter and intimidation with a dangerous weapon.

Johnson sentenced him to ten years in prison for each offense and ordered that both sentences be served consecutively, so that the maximum sentence would be twenty years in total.

Pettigrew pleaded guilty to killing 18-year-old Patrick Walker and wounding 20-year-old Silas Hall on May 2, 2023.

At 7:11 p.m. that day, police and emergency personnel were dispatched to the 100 block of North 10th Street for a report of a man with a gunshot wound. Walker was found lying on the sidewalk and pronounced dead at the scene.

While police were en route to North 10th Street, they received a report of a man with a gunshot wound in the emergency room at UnityPoint Health -Trinity Regional Medical Center. That man was identified as Hall, and police quickly determined that Hall and Walker had been shot in the same incident.

Pettigrew was identified as a suspect and arrested in Davenport on May 29, 2023.

He was accused of shooting the other two men from a vehicle driven by 17-year-old Haydin Mapel of Fort Dodge.

He was initially charged with first-degree murder and attempted murder.

Like all defendants who are sentenced, Pettigrew had the right to speak in court on Friday, but he declined to do so.

A victim impact statement was read during the sentencing. A representative from the Domestic and Sexual Assault Outreach Center read a statement from Walker’s mother, Latrece Martin, who was not present in the courtroom.

In the statement, Martin called her son her best friend and added that she has not been able to sleep at night since his death.

“He’s gone, he’s gone, he’s gone and he’s never coming back.” Martin wrote.

Johnson said Pettigrew would one day be released from prison and expressed hope that he could get his life together.

“I hope you can transform this negative energy into something positive,” he said.

He added that he hopes Pettigrew will develop into a person who does not give in to peer pressure and enjoys being around positive people.

For her involvement in the crime, Mapel was initially charged with aiding and abetting premeditated murder and aiding and abetting attempted murder. In May, she pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting after the fact. On June 3, she was sentenced to two years’ probation and granted a suspended sentence, meaning she will have no criminal record if she successfully completes her probation and pays a civil penalty and court costs.

The shooting of Walker and Hall was the first of several homicides in Fort Dodge over the past year. One of those killings was a direct result of Walker’s death. Pettigrew’s younger brother, Jameel Redding-Pettigrew, 15, was shot and killed at the intersection of Fourth Avenue South and 15th Street on the night of July 4, 2023. Jamarrion Davis of Fort Dodge, described as a friend of Walker, was convicted of first-degree murder. He is serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole.