PUBLISHED SATURDAY, JUNE 21, 2003

Two sentenced in separate murder cases

Brett Norman
@PensacolaNewsJournal.com

Two young men convicted of manslaughter were sentenced Friday morning - one for shooting his uncle in the groin with a shotgun, the other for stabbing a Pensacola teen during a fight.

Alfred Bruce Hall, who admitted to killing his uncle, Roger Rodgers, 45, pleaded for mercy from Circuit Judge Terry Terrell, but he got little in return.

"I held (Rodgers') hand, and he told me he loved me - that he was sorry - after I called the police," Hall said. "I couldn't do nothing but cry."

Hall was convicted May 22 in the Oct. 30 shooting, after a jury rejected his claim that he was acting in self-defense during a fight.

Assistant State Attorney David Rimmer asked that Hall not be sentenced to less than the recommended minimum of just more than 10 years in prison. But Terrell, citing the 20-year-old defendant's extensive juvenile record, sentenced him to 25 years for manslaughter with a firearm.

The second manslaughter sentencing involved Vinson Hall, 24, who was wanted by Escambia County sheriff's deputies for eight months before he was arrested May 3, 2002.

Investigators identified Hall as a suspect shortly after the September 2001 stabbing death of Hardie Lashawn Bender, 19, in the courtyard of the Sunrise Apartments on Fairfield Drive.

Hall, who investigator Buddy NeSmith said fled to New Orleans after stabbing Bender repeatedly in the chest, pleaded guilty to manslaughter May 16. Witnesses said the two men were fighting in the courtyard.

Hall was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison.