JEFFERSON COUNTY — The jury trial scheduled for Monday of a 19-year-old Mt. Vernon man charged in Jefferson County Court with first degree murder has been continued.
Jurors in the trial of Roderick S. Oats Jr., were scheduled to be selected Monday, but the trial has been continued until May 1, with a pre-trial conference scheduled for March 28.
Oats is charged with three counts first degree murder in connection with the July 2017 shooting death of Carlos Johnson.
Mt. Vernon police responded around 4:35 a.m. Saturday, July 9, 2017, to the 700 block of South 25th Street for a report of shots fired.
Officials were later contacted by an area hospital of a man brought into the emergency room with gunshot wounds. Jefferson County Coroner Roger Hayse declared 20-year-old Carlos Johnson, of Mt. Vernon, dead of a gunshot wound.
Oats was arrested in Benton, Ill. just after 11:30 that night. At the time of his arrest he was free on $2,500 cash bond after being arrested in January 2017 for alleged possession of a stolen firearm and carrying or possessing a firearm without a FOID card.
He had been a passenger in a car stopped when leaving a party in Salem where two people had been shot.
While he wasn’t a suspect in that shooting incident, he was allegedly found in possession of a 38 caliber handgun that was reportedly loaded with four bullets and had the hammer cocked. The gun was reported stolen in 1982 from Hanover, Massachusetts.