RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A former University of Virginia student pleaded guilty Wednesday to fatally shooting three football players and wounding two other students on the Charlottesville campus in 2022. Christopher Darnell Jones Jr.
, 25, pleaded guilty to three counts of first-degree murder, two counts of aggravated malicious wounding and five counts of use of a firearm in the commission of a felony. A four-day sentencing hearing is scheduled to begin Feb. 4 in Albemarle County Circuit Court.
Jones had been scheduled to stand trial on charges that included aggravated murder, which carries a mandatory sentence of life without parole in Virginia. The first-degree murder charges he pleaded guilty to in a plea agreement with prosecutors carry a sentence of 20 years to life. Authorities said that Jones opened fire on a charter bus as he and other students arrived back on campus after seeing a play and having dinner together in Washington, D.
C. Authorities had not released a motive. Jones was a former member of the university's football team at the time of the shooting.
A witness told police that he had targeted specific victims. Football players Lavel Davis Jr., D’Sean Perry and Devin Chandler were killed, while a fourth member of the team, Mike Hollins, and another student, Marlee Morgan, were wounded.
The shooting erupted near a parking garage and set off panic and a 12-hour lockdown of the historic campus until the suspect was captured. Many at the school of about 23,000 stude.