Black Shooter Found Guilty for Drive-By Murder of White Woman

Columbus Dispatch
August 31, 2015

pallenberg
Patricia Pallenberg was shot dead when the Black gunman fired shots into the truck which she was a passenger in.

Brian W. Hill didn’t show any emotion on Friday when a Franklin County jury convicted him of killing a woman in a drive-by shooting last year in North Linden.

He’s been through the experience before. In 1991, a jury found him guilty of aggravated murder for killing a man during a drug deal.

Hill, 47, spent 18 years in prison for that slaying.

This time, he could be sentenced to life without parole.

The jury in the drive-by case deliberated for about an hour on Thursday afternoon and just over an hour on Friday morning before convicting Hill of aggravated murder, attempted murder, felonious assault and tampering with evidence.

Common Pleas Judge Julie M. Lynch will sentence him on Tuesday.

nichols-hill
Terry R. Nichols, left, and Brian W. Hill were also shooting at the wrong person.

Patricia Pallenberg, 54, died when shots were fired into a truck in which she was a passenger on Hiawatha Street north of E. Hudson Street on the night of Feb. 11, 2014. The driver of the truck was not injured.

Witnesses at the trial included Hill’s co-defendant, Terry R. Nichols. He testified that he was driving a pickup truck with Hill as a passenger and told Hill to shoot at another truck, mistakenly thinking that the occupants included a man with whom he had a dispute. One bullet struck Pallenberg in the head.

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