A Jefferson Parish judge on Thursday (Aug. 21) sentenced Curtis Thomas III to life in prison for his conviction of shooting two men in a Westwego-area home, killing one and injuring the other.
Thomas, 33, of Bridge City, was convicted by a jury on July 16 of the second-degree murder of Charles McGehee, 50, and the attempted second-degree murder of a 28-year-old Westwego man.
Thomas shot the men on the night of Feb. 13, 2022, inside a residence in the 600 block of Emile Avenue. Thomas, his father, the homeowner and the two victims were at the residence in part to watch the Super Bowl.
The television and a single lightbulb that illuminated the kitchen and living room areas were powered by an extension cord. The electrical flow was briefly cut off, darkening the room. It was then that, without provocation, Thomas opened fire with a .380-caliber semiautomatic pistol.
A bullet passed through McGehee’s right shoulder and entered his torso, killing him. The other victim was shot in the arm and fled on foot. Thomas’s father later drove that victim to a hospital.
After shooting the men, Thomas walked out of the house. He was no more than 140 feet away when a Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office deputy responding to the gunshots approached him. Thomas was still carrying the pistol.
“I know you must be thinking: There must be more to this. There must be something more that we’re missing,” Assistant District Attorney Molly Love told jurors in closing argument on July 16. “You’re thinking this because it is so hard to believe that someone is capable of committing such a terrible and violent act.
“But no. There’s nothing more to it,” ADA Love said in urging jurors to find Thomas guilty as charged. “It is just that simple. He was caught walking away from the murder scene with the murder weapon and Charles McGehee’s blood on his socks.”
The surviving gunshot victim later told detectives that Thomas was the shooter. The other witnesses, Thomas’ father and the homeowner died in 2023.
At trial, Thomas’s attorneys argued that the Sheriff’s Office did not sufficiently investigate the case and asserted that the fact that Thomas had the murder weapon when he was arrested did not mean he was the shooter.
The jury deliberated almost four hours in convicting Thomas as charged of the three offenses.
During Thursday’s sentencing hearing, members of McGehee’s family provided victim-impact testimony, telling Thomas of the kind of man McGehee was: a loving, gentle giant. McGehee taught all the children how to ride bikes, they said. When his brother-in-law was dying, McGehee drove to his home in Jacksonville, Fla., packed his apartment and moved him back to Louisiana, where he wanted to die.
“There was absolutely no reason for you to shoot that gun,” McGehee’s sister told Thomas. “You destroyed a whole family. Charles didn’t deserve it.”
One of McGehee’s daughters noted their last conversation, hours before he died. “’I love you. See you tomorrow,’” he told her. “There was no tomorrow for him,” she said.
Thomas was barred from possessing firearms because of his July 15, 2011 conviction of attempted second-degree murder in Orleans Parish Criminal District Court. He received a 10-year prison sentence for that crime, in which he shot a man as he entered a store at North Dorgenois and O’Reilly streets.
Life in prison without benefit of probation, parole or suspension of sentence is the mandatory punishment for second-degree murder under Louisiana law. Judge Stephen Enright of the 24th Judicial District Court sentenced Thomas to 50 years for attempted second-degree murder and 20 years for Thomas’s conviction of being a felon in possession of a firearm. He ran the sentences concurrently.
Assistant District Attorneys Molly Love and Taylor Somerville prosecuted the case.