Lamar Hudson Jr. guilty of father's murder, to serve 26 years to life (UPDATED)

Lamar Hudson Jr. pleaded guilty Tuesday to the September 2021 shooting death of his father Lamar Hudson Sr. in Elyria and was sentenced to 26 years to life in prison. Hudson Jr., 26, of Lorain, pleaded guilty to aggravated murder, two charges of murder, felonious assault, two charges of tampering with evidence and two charges of having a weapon under disability. Many of the charges were merged together for sentencing purposes, so in effect Hudson Jr. was sentenced for aggravated murder and two firearms specifications related to the fact that he used an illegal gun in the commission of the crime. The end result was that Hudson Jr. faces life in prison with no possibility of parole for 26 years, and will be credited with 1,216 days served, just over three years. He also was ordered to pay $4,388 in restitution to his uncle, Hudson Sr.'s brother, Lee Hudson, and $800 to his aunt and his father's sister, Shamon Hudson. The Lorain County Prosecutor's Office had accused Hudson Jr. of shooting Hudson Sr. while the elder Hudson sat in his car on Gulf Road in Elyria on Sept. 27, 2021. Hudson Sr. was a father of six and a decorated U.S. Army Veteran, attaining the rank of sergeant and serving two tours in Iraq and Bosnia. In January 2022, Hudson Jr. was found not competent to stand trial on the charges against him, and was ordered to undergo mental health treatment at Twin Valley Behavioral Healthcare Hospital in Columbus until he was determined to be competent. At the time he had pleaded not guilty to the 10 charges leveled against him. After Hudson Jr. was found competent to stand trial, defense attorney Kenneth Lieux entered an amended plea of guilty on his client's behalf, which Rothgery accepted Tuesday. "When my mother died, it's like a different person was living inside of me. I don't know how to explain it, but I felt I wasn't the same person anymore," Hudson Jr. said in court "... I thought I was doing what was right at the time because I feel like I was getting mixed signals and like, like, like a higher power telling me that (it) was the right thing to do. I know it wasn't right. I was wrong. I take a hundred percent accountability for what I did. And I just wanna say, I apologize, I'm sorry to my family and I hope one day you can forgive me." Before sentencing, Lorain County Common Pleas Court Judge Christopher Rothgery heard from the prosecution and several family members of Hudson Sr., including his brother Lee Hudson, the younger Hudson's uncle, and his son Daeon Hudson, the younger's brother. Chief Assistant Lorain County Prosecutor Chris Pierre said that on Sept. 27, the day that Hudson Sr. was shot, he had just returned from a weeklong visit to Washington state to watch Daeon Hudson play football at Central Washington University. "(Hudson Sr.) returned at seven o'clock to our area, by 11:30 p.m. he had been shot dead by his other son, the defendant, five times as he was stopped on Gulf Road, sitting in his own Chevrolet Camaro," Pierre said. "The defendant not only did that to his father, but left him in the middle of the street, hid the murder weapon … and then went on to spend the rest of the evening with friends doing doughnuts in his rental vehicle in a field." Lee Hudson said in court it was his hope that Rothgery would not show his nephew any mercy, because he felt that Hudson Jr. was still a danger to the community and his family. "The way they found my brother was — was crazy," Lee Hudson told the court. "(Hudson Jr. is) just a coward, your honor. I just honestly believe that if he gets out of prison this type of rage and anger that he has would just continue. I just pray that, you know, he can get justice, you know, an eye for an eye." Additionally, Lee Hudson said that messages Hudson Jr. had shared in Lorain County Jail over the past three years had gotten back to the Hudson family, making them feel disrespected and unsafe. "I just want the court to understand that (Hudson Jr.) chose a path of jealousy, rage and during this whole three year ordeal never really took responsibility," Lee Hudson said. "Evading the courts and writing letters to different people and we get messages on the street, basically, family members fearing for their own life." Daeon Hudson spoke about how the murder had thrown both himself and the family as a whole into division and confusion. "I lost two best friends in this situation," he said. "I lost my only father, I lost my only big brother. … When it came to this, sometimes it felt like I was talking to my brother, but like when we talked, the switch flipped my head. I'm like, I'm also talking to my dad's killer." He recounted the final times he saw his father on that visit at CWU, saying that his brother and father spoke on the phone throughout the trip. "I just remember little Lamar calling every, every day," Daeon Hudson said. "They was on the phone every day. I didn't see no signs, I didn't think nothing like this. I always thought we was a close-knit family. … We're supposed to be accountable for our actions, but the only bad thing is we don't really get the closure because we don't know why ... I want to be able to have a why one day." Contact Owen MacMillan at (440) 329-7123 or omacmillan@chroniclet.com.