Orange County man sentenced to 13 years in Lynchburg murder

An Orange County man was sentenced Friday to 13 years in prison for killing a Lynchburg man in a motel parking lot in April 2008.

Marcious Antoine Cousins, who turned 27 Friday, was sentenced in Lynchburg Circuit Court to five years for second-degree murder, three years on the use of a firearm in the commission of a felony and five years for possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

The charges stem from the April 20, 2008 shooting of 24-year-old Michael Blanchard Jr. at the Super 8 motel on Candlers Mountain Road.

Cousins was found guilty on two of the three charges in a jury trial in February. Judge Mosby Perrow upheld the jury verdicts.

Cousins was found guilty on the firearm possession charge last month.

Just before his sentence was announced, Cousins said he knows Blanchard’s death impacted two families.

“If I could change anything I would, but unfortunately I can’t,” Cousins said. “All of this has changed me. I realize a lot of things I took for granted before.”

During the trial, a prosecutor asserted Cousins used a 9 mm handgun to shoot an unarmed man in the back, then sped away.

Cousins’ attorney said Cousins acted in self-defense.

Both agreed that Cousins arrived at the hotel around 3 a.m. to pick up a female friend. The girl wasn’t in the parking lot when he pulled up, so he was circling the building when a man later identified as Charles Scott yelled something at the car.

Testimony revealed an argument of some kind ensued between Scott and Cousins. Then, Blanchard walked up and continued the argument through the car window.

Cousins testified that first Scott and then Blanchard swung punches in the car and tried to open the door.

Cousins said he didn’t know the gun was in the car until he saw it sitting on the bench seat. He used it because he feared for his life, he said.

“There will not be any justice for Mr. Blanchard,” said Deputy Commonwealth’s Attorney Jeff Bennett. “He’s the one person who can’t tell his side of what happened … or the promise his life would hold in the future.“

While Cousins has children, and “he’s going to miss milestones,” Bennett said, “those children will still have a father.”

Defense attorney Andrew Childress argued there were many ways the story could have changed, such as if the weapon hadn’t been in the car that night or if Blanchard had not come out of the hotel.

“These inexperienced young men made a decision based on fear, stress and bravado,” Childress said. “And now a life is gone. … It’s just plain tragic. Everyone in this room today is powerless to fix it.”

Lisa Harris, Cousins’ mother, testified that she has been visiting her son in jail and talking to the other inmates held there, whom she said Cousins has been teaching and encouraging.

His fiancée, Melissa Rodriguez, testified Cousins has been leading Bible studies.

“I see the person that I have always known him to be,” Harris said.

Rodriguez said Cousins wants to work with young people when he is released from prison, talking to them about what he’s been through and trying to steer them away from crime and violence.