Bellamy gets 20 years in Ridgeland Acres murders

By DEUCE NIVEN

    An area man could spend 20 years in prison after entering a guilty plea to two murders in Superior Court here on Tuesday, District Attorney Jon David announced Wednesday.
    Ronald Eugene Bellamy, 46, of Bellamy-Gore Lane, Whiteville, had been charged with capital murder in the Dec. 12, 2010 killings of Lee Otis Vereen and Jerome Williams. He pled guilty to two counts of second-degree murder, David said in a news release.
    Bellamy was sentenced to serve from 200 to 249 months in prison, 16.66 to 20.75 years. He was given credit for 20 months he was held in jail awaiting trial.
    Bellamy “initiated plans to rob Vereen of drugs and money,” David said. Vereen, 42, was shot and killed during the robbery, investigators have said previously. Williams, 39 and Vereen’s half-brother, was shot and killed as he fled, about 150 yards from their mother’s home in the Ridgeland Acres trailer park east of Tabor City.

Co-defendants
    Others awaiting trial in the murders are Jonathan Dewayne Gore, 25, and Dryan Escabedo Vereen, 24, of Tabor City; and Antwan Omar Wright, 25, of Whiteville.
    Two others charged in the case have already entered guilty pleas.
    Canisha Laporsha Bell, 22, of Tabor City, entered a guilty plea in January to a single charge of armed robbery, was sentenced to serve 38 to 55 months in prison, with credit for 21 months in jail awaiting trial.
    Jacques Ali Vereen, 19, also of Tabor City, entered a guilty plea in July 2012 to a charge of being an accessory after the fact of robbery and murder. He was sentenced to serve from 44 to 62 months in prison, with credit of 16 months in jail.