In the early morning hours of July 13, 2022, Justin Allen Pierce, a 32-year-old White man from Lancaster, Ohio, was shot and killed. Deputies with the Fairfield County Sheriff's Office responded to reports of a shooting just after 2 a.m. at the Colonial Estates Mobile Home Park on Columbus-Lancaster Road. They found Pierce outside a home with a single gunshot wound.
Medical personnel from Greenfield Township attempted lifesaving measures, but he was pronounced dead at the scene.
The investigation quickly led to a person of interest who also lived in the mobile home park. Authorities stated the shooting followed a dispute between Pierce and another resident, 27-year-old Cody Blaine. Blaine told deputies that he and Pierce had a physical confrontation before the shooting occurred. Law enforcement arrested Blaine and charged him with aggravated murder in connection with Pierce's death.
Blaine’s case went to trial, where he faced charges of murder and aggravated murder. In November 2023, a jury found him not guilty on both counts. The jury concluded that Blaine had acted in self-defense when he shot Pierce. Following the verdict, County Prosecutor Kyle Witt stated, "We respect the jury's verdict on this. It's obviously not the outcome that we wanted or that we were hoping for... The jury obviously reached a conclusion that the state did not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it was not self-defense."
Although acquitted of murder, Blaine faced a separate charge for having a firearm under disability, as a prior juvenile conviction for gross sexual imposition prohibited him from legally owning a gun as an adult. After having already served 498 days in the county jail, Blaine was sentenced on the firearm charge by a Fairfield County judge. The legal proceedings in the death of Justin Pierce concluded in November 2023 with a sentence for Blaine of five years of community control, which will begin after he completes six months of mandatory substance abuse and mental health treatment.
