Alexander David “Alex” Cavanah, a 22-year-old male from Edinboro, Pennsylvania, died on January 25, 2020, after he was shot during an attempted robbery at the Wendy's restaurant in Washington Township, near Edinboro, where he worked as a manager. Online sources did not make his race or ethnicity available. The shooting happened in the afternoon, shortly after 2 p.m., when a masked man entered the restaurant armed with a 9 mm handgun and tried to force employees to give him money.
The gunman was later identified as Markese Denashawn Lampley, an Erie-area man who was 21 at the time of the crime. Authorities said Lampley arrived at the Wendy's on a motorcycle wearing dark clothing, a ski mask, and a motorcycle helmet. Inside the restaurant, he confronted employees and tried to get access to the safe. Witnesses described him as angry and armed, and two employees testified that he chambered a round in the handgun while trying to force the robbery forward.
Cavanah stepped into the struggle as the robbery unfolded. During the confrontation, the helmet came off the assailant, and Cavanah fought with him. Cavanah was shot in the leg and back, with other reports describing wounds to his leg and abdomen. He was taken to UPMC Hamot in Erie, where he died from his injuries. Investigators and later court testimony portrayed Cavanah as someone who tried to protect his coworkers during the attack.
Lampley fled from the restaurant on the motorcycle and headed north on Interstate 79. State police arrested him later that same day. He was charged with first-degree murder, second-degree murder, robbery, aggravated assault, possessing instruments of crime, simple assault, recklessly endangering another person, fleeing or attempting to elude police, and multiple summary motor vehicle offenses. The case moved through Erie County Court of Common Pleas under docket CP-25-CR-0000597-2020.
The evidence against Lampley was described in later appellate filings as extensive. It included eyewitness testimony, surveillance video, gunshot residue found on his hands, cell phone location data, and his own admissions. While in the Erie County Prison, Lampley made phone calls that prosecutors used as evidence, and he also wrote a letter to a district magistrate in which he admitted he tried to rob the Wendy's. In that letter, he said he needed money for a real estate class, a GED, the title to a BMW, and to take his child's mother out to eat. He also wrote that he did not mean to kill Cavanah.
Before trial, Lampley rejected his attorney and chose to represent himself. He claimed sovereign-citizen beliefs, asked to be addressed as “Mileage Galor Bey,” and argued that the court had no jurisdiction over him. The judge rejected those claims but allowed him to proceed without counsel after finding that he knowingly and voluntarily waived his right to an attorney. Standby counsel remained available during the trial.
After a four-day jury trial, Lampley was convicted on July 2, 2021. The jury found him guilty of second-degree murder, three counts of aggravated assault causing serious bodily injury, robbery inflicting serious bodily injury, possessing instruments of crime, two counts of simple assault, six counts of recklessly endangering another person, fleeing or attempting to elude police, and ten summary motor vehicle offenses. The jury's verdict came after deliberations that were reported as lasting roughly an hour and fifteen minutes, including time for lunch.
On August 18, 2021, Erie County Judge John J. Trucilla sentenced Lampley to mandatory life in prison without the possibility of parole for second-degree murder. The court also imposed an additional consecutive sentence of 13 to 44 years in prison for the related convictions. At sentencing, the judge described Cavanah as a hero and contrasted Cavanah's life with Lampley's, noting that Cavanah had been married and was studying to become a pastor through the Church of the Nazarene.
Lampley later appealed, focusing on issues related to his self-representation and the conduct of standby counsel, rather than directly challenging the evidence that connected him to the killing. In 2023, the Pennsylvania Superior Court sent the case back for a limited hearing on whether Lampley had fully understood the charges and whether his waiver of counsel had been valid. After additional review, the appellate court affirmed the judgment of sentence in 2024, leaving his conviction and life-without-parole sentence in place.
