Joshua Wayne Andrews

Serial Killer

Joshua Wayne Andrews

Joshua Wayne Andrews is an American convicted murderer whose known violence stretched from Colorado to Virginia and New York. His criminal history includes three murders to which he ultimately pleaded guilty, a double homicide for which he was acquitted in Colorado, and several shootings in which the victims survived. The most concentrated period of violence occurred between December 2001 and January 2002, when Andrews and associate Jamel Saleks Crawford were connected to a series of robberies and shootings that left three men dead and several others wounded. Andrews was born in 1982 and spent much of his childhood in Colorado. His background later became an important part of the sentencing proceedings against him. His father was imprisoned on death row in Texas and was killed by another prisoner before he could be executed. Andrews also suffered severe burns during childhood after being set on fire in a neighborhood incident, leaving lasting scars. By his early teenage years, he had begun accumulating a juvenile criminal record that included an attempted aggravated robbery conviction and other increasingly serious encounters with authorities.

The 2000 Colorado Double Homicide

One of the earliest murder cases connected to Andrews involved the deaths of his brother, Roman Martin, and Martin's teenage girlfriend, Krisunda Jeanne Temple. On April 3, 2000, Martin and Temple were shot to death inside a residence in Aurora, Colorado. Temple was 15 years old. Investigators focused on Andrews, who was accused of having serious conflicts with his brother in the period before the killings. Prosecutors alleged that Andrews was responsible for the shooting and charged him with two counts of murder. The defense disputed the state's case and suggested that the killings could have been connected to conflicts involving other people. When the case went to trial in 2001, prosecutors were unable to establish Andrews' guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. He was acquitted of both murders. The Colorado case therefore cannot properly be counted as a murder conviction against Andrews. Roman Martin and Krisunda Temple are sometimes included among his alleged victims because Andrews was formally prosecuted for their deaths, but a jury found him not guilty. No later conviction established that he killed them.

The Murder of Clayton Kendall Breeding

By 2001, Andrews was living in the Woodbridge area of Northern Virginia. On December 12, 2001, 24-year-old Clayton Kendall Breeding was fatally shot in the parking lot of Rippon Middle School in Woodbridge. Breeding was found with gunshot wounds in or near his vehicle. Investigators believed the killing may have involved drugs and that Breeding probably knew the person responsible. Forensic evidence eventually connected Breeding's killing to the later shootings of Romanno Head, Robert Morrison, and Rutherford Berry. Ballistics testing determined that bullets recovered from Breeding were consistent with bullets associated with the January 2002 shootings. Prosecutors consequently charged Andrews with Breeding's murder. When Andrews was tried in Virginia in 2007, however, the case involving Breeding presented prosecutors with difficulties. The court determined that the evidence was insufficient to establish the robbery theory originally used to support a capital murder charge. The charge was reduced, and the jury ultimately acquitted Andrews of Breeding's murder. The acquittal did not become the final word. Several years later, while Andrews faced the possibility of another death-penalty sentencing proceeding, his attorneys and prosecutors negotiated an unusual agreement. On May 31, 2012, Andrews formally accepted responsibility for Breeding's death and pleaded guilty to his murder. He specifically waived the protection that ordinarily would have prevented another prosecution following his earlier acquittal. In exchange, prosecutors agreed that Andrews would receive life imprisonment rather than face another attempt to sentence him to death. ...

Confirmed Victims: (5)

Clayton Kendall Breeding Age: (24), Date of Death: 2001-12-12

Survivors:

Rutherford Berry , Date of Attack: 2002-01-02

Gary Kennedy , Date of Attack: 2002-01-04

Mr. Atanda , Date of Attack: 2002-01-07

James Celestine , Date of Attack: 2002-01-07

Joshua Wayne Andrews | Murderpedia