HAMILTON, Ohio — The man accused of murder after a fatal shooting outside a bar in Fairfield last March was found guilty as charged Friday.
A jury in Butler County convicted 25-year-old Demarko J. Merriweather of murder and felonious assault, after police said he shot and killed 55-year-old Vincent Brown, Jr. outside Wise Guys Bar and Grill on Dixie Highway on March 22.
According to Fairfield police, officers were initially called for a fight taking place outside the bar, and, while on the way, learned that shots had been fired.
A second person was involved in the shooting and suffered non-life threatening injuries.
In the weeks following the shooting, Fairfield City Council objected to the renewal of Wise Guys’ liquor permit, citing “numerous fight calls, two assaults, a rape case, two narcotics complaints, weapons violations and intoxicated individuals” at the bar over a year period, according to WCPO media partner the Journal-News.
“It’s routine on the evening shift to be out at that bar,” Fairfield Police Chief Mike Dickey told the Journal-News. “The bar attracts the kind of crowd they want to attract. That’s part of the problem.”
Merriweather had not been sentenced Friday.