Man sentenced for fatally shooting Fairview Heights teen during attempted robbery

A St. Clair County judge sentenced a St. Louis man to 25 years in a state prison for a murder he committed when he was a teenager.

In March, Danayeous M. Macon, 22, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in the shooting death of Kameran J. Dorsey at his home in Fairview Heights. Judge John O’Gara levied the sentence Friday.

Investigators determined that Macon was an acquaintance who had been invited to Dorsey’s home on Feb. 20, 2020, but plotted with another person to rob him.

It was in the early evening on that date that Fairview Heights officers were dispatched to Lakeland Hills Drive in Fairview Heights, where Dorsey lived with his mother. They found Dorsey in the garage, wounded by gunfire.

Marquita Mitchell, Dorsey’s mother, said she heard the gunshots as they were fired. When her son didn’t respond to her calls, she ran to the garage, which Dorsey used as a place to exercise and listen to music. She found her injured son on the floor.

The Major Case Squad of Greater St. Louis was activated and learned of the plan to rob Dorsey.

“This was not a random act of violence,” the Major Case Squad said in a statement.

Macon and Dominic Wilbourn, of Swansea, were arrested and charged less than a week after the shooting.

Wilbourn, who was defended by former St. Clair County board chairman and circuit judge John Baricevic, waived his right to a jury trial and was found not guilty by O’Gara in July of 2021, according to court records.

Baricevic successfully argued to have Wilbourn’s statement to police suppressed from evidence since Wilbourn was still a high school student and police lied to him about the existence of surveillance footage during an hours-long investigation.

“Investigators indicated cooperation would benefit Dominic Wilbourn when they knew that the cooperation they wanted would lead to his arrest,” Baricevic argued in his motion.

Mitchell said her son was fun-loving and popular, she said. He played football in high school but was forced to quit when he was diagnosed with epilepsy, she said.

This story was originally published June 16, 2023 at 5:19 PM.