Man Sentenced to 36 Years in Drug-Related Killing

A D.C. man who killed a teenager whom he was trying to strong-arm for $130 worth of marijuana in a Hyattsville high-rise apartment building last year was sentenced yesterday in Prince George's County to 36 years in prison.

Circuit Court Judge Crystal D. Mittelstaedt imposed the sentence on Marshalleck Ellis, 19, of the 700 block of Harvard Street NW. Ellis pleaded guilty in September to first-degree murder and a firearms violation in the shooting death of Donald J. Smalls Jr., 19.

Ellis's co-defendant, Arlen C. Garrett, 23, pleaded guilty to attempted armed robbery and a handgun violation. Under the terms of Garrett's plea agreement with prosecutors, Mittelstaedt yesterday sentenced Garrett -- who at the time of the murder was a Howard University student -- to eight years in prison.

During the hearing, Crystal Carter, a Howard student who lived with Smalls, told Mittelstaedt that she had accepted Smalls's marriage proposal two days before the attack.

Carter, who was in another part of the apartment when the shooting occurred, said, "The incident replays in my mind every day." She said she was so shaken by it that she fell behind in her studies, moved in with her mother and is now receiving public assistance Carter, 22, gave birth to Smalls's daughter a few months after the killing. She said Smalls had accepted a job offer in New York just before the attack.

"The perpetrators will never be punished enough for this crime, because my fiance is never coming back," she told the judge.

Before they were sentenced, Ellis and Garrett told Smalls's relatives and friends that they were sorry.

Garrett also apologized to his parents; his father is an architect and his mother is a high school teacher in the District. Garrett, a pianist, had obtained a music scholarship to attend Howard and also played soccer at the school. Ellis said he was raised by his grandmother after his father was killed and his mother was incarcerated. His father was shot to death in the District in February 1990, about three weeks after Ellis was born. Ellis said he grew up surrounded by drug dealers, gamblers and hustlers, and "I wanted to be like them."

Smalls, known as "D.J.," was fatally shot about 2 p.m. Feb. 29 inside a 10th-floor apartment at the Towers at University Town Center, an apartment complex in the 6500 block of Belcrest Road populated primarily by area college students.

Smalls was shot in the lower part of his torso, prosecutors said.

Assistant State's Attorney Wesley Adams said at the hearing that Ellis and Garrett, also of Northwest Washington, went into the apartment to buy marijuana from Smalls or rob him if they did not get a deal they liked.

Carter was in another part of the apartment when she heard Smalls say, "I can't do that, man," followed by gunshots, Adams said.

Ellis and Garrett then fled without taking any of the marijuana, prosecutors said.

Surveillance cameras in the apartment building's hallways and lobby captured photos of the two attackers walking to and from Smalls's apartment. The photos helped county homicide detective Brian Selway track down the suspects.