Robins Air Force Base airman going on military trial on felony murder, arson charges

A portion of a brick wall, a pile of rubble and a charred child’s toy are all that’s left of the Spruce Street residence that allegedly was torched nearly five years ago in an insurance scam.

Demetrius Hardy, 27, a civilian worker at Robins Air Force Base, died several days later from injuries he sustained in the early morning blaze Oct. 2, 2011.

His friend, Senior Airman Charles Amos Wilson III from Robins Air Force Base, is scheduled to go on trial Monday before a military court on felony murder, arson and related charges.

Wilson, 28, a support member of the 461st Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, is accused of agreeing to pay Hardy to set fire to the rental property for Wilson to claim insurance money on his belongings. Hardy died Oct. 10, 2011.

Robins spokesman Roland Leach said by email late Friday afternoon that “the prosecution is preparing for a fully litigated trial next week.”

The court is expected to convene at 9 a.m. Monday. The trial, expected to last seven to 10 days, is the first of three courts-martial proceedings against Wilson. All are expected to be held in a courtroom at the Houston County Courthouse is Perry.

A Telegraph request Wednesday for interviews with prosecution and defense attorneys was declined, Leach said.

Lt. Col David Frakt, an active reservist in the Air Force JAG Corps and a former member of Wilson’s defense team, said military courts have never had a felony murder case like this one.

He said prosecutors will first have to prove that Wilson put Hardy up to the arson.

“Here’s the twist, and this is the same all over the country, including Georgia,” Frakt said. “If you conspire to commit a felony, let’s say he hired Demetrius Hardy to burn down his house, if someone else died in the fire … that is absolutely a felony murder. When the co-defendant dies, that is a different story.”

Frakt said that if prosecutors argue that Wilson is guilty because Hardy’s death was a furtherance of the conspiracy, that won’t wash because his death actually thwarted the conspiracy.

If the prosecution argues that the arson led to a death during the preparation of an arson, then in most cases, that is enough to prove felony murder — except the co-defendant must be physically present and actively participating in the arson, Frakt said.

“In cases where a co-conspirator acts alone — goes to the arson site alone and burns down the place alone and burns up in the fire that he started, the (civilian) courts have uniformly held that it is not felony murder. … It’s basically suicide,” Frakt said.

“To think of it another way, you can only charge Wilson with felony murder if you can also charge Hardy with felony murder because it’s what’s called vicarious liability. It’s liability through the acts of another. It’s not murder to kill yourself,” Frakt contended.

The second courts-martial proceeding is scheduled for June 6. In that case, Wilson is accused of threatening and assaulting a retired technical sergeant in July 2012. He allegedly held a gun to her head, then fired it into a field near his home before later driving his pickup toward her in a threatening manner.

In addition, Wilson is charged with the premeditated murder in the fatal shooting of his fiancee, Tameda Ferguson, and her unborn child at her Dawson home in August 2013 for $1 million in insurance money. A date for the third courts-martial proceeding has not been set. Wilson may face the death penalty if convicted.

Wilson was being held Friday at the Houston County jail in Perry, where he has been incarcerated since May 13 in preparation of the courts-martial proceedings.

This story was originally published May 20, 2016 at 5:36 PM with the headline "Robins Air Force Base airman going on military trial on felony murder, arson charges."