By Isaac Avilucea
With more than two dozen arrests and nine convictions on his record, William Marshall was a career criminal. But despite his shortcomings, he was beloved by his ex-girlfriend’s family. They had known him since he was a teenager, even had a nickname for him — Dollar — and tried to help him overcome his past demons.
He betrayed that trust on Nov. 16, 2012, when Marshall, distraught over the disintegration of his relationship with Ruschell Fireall, used his vehicle to run his former lover off the road and then shot her multiple times with a 9 mm handgun on Pennington Avenue in front of her family.
Marshall, 46, will likely spend the rest of his life in prison after he was sentenced Tuesday to 30 years in prison for the murder.
Days before the murder, Marshall had repeatedly assured his ex-girlfriend’s family he would hurt himself before he would hurt her, making the betrayal harder for them to fathom.
The couple knew each other since they were 14 years old. Fireall’s relatives had absorbed Marshall into the family and considered him one of their own. Many of them showed up to the sentencing wearing memory shirts.
Dwayne Latimar, the victim’s brother, said Marshall betrayed that trust and affection by gunning down a loving mother and sister after she broke off the relationship and filed for a restraining order. Latimar was one of more than a dozen family members who showed up at Marshall’s sentencing.
The last time he spoke to his sister was a week before the murder. She had told him she feared Marshall, who had grown increasingly menacing in the month and a half since she chose to end the relationship. Latimar stared directly at Marshall while he spoke, forcing him to recall their last conversation. “I told you, ‘Stop kicking my sister’s door in.’”
Latimar said Marshall assured him he loved Fireall and would never hurt him, that he was just stung by her decision to leave. Feeling for Marshall, Latimar took a $100 bill from his pocket and handed it to Marshall. Marshall hugged and thanked him.
“Everybody on that side gave you love and supported you,” Latimar said, pointing toward his family. “Aint none of your family is here. Your family was right there. You took everything from my family, dog.”
Then he gunned down the 42-year-old Fireall, accompanied a friend to a casino and fled to Georgia to hide from authorities. He was taken into custody weeks later after an intensive manhunt, Mercer County Assistant Prosecutor Michelle Gasparian said.
“If she didn’t want to be with him, she would cease to exist,” she said.
Fireall’s 14-year-old daughter Breanna said she blamed herself for the death. She lamented her mother won’t be able to see her graduate from eighth grade. She still has a hard time coming to grips with the fact that her mother’s killer is someone she was close with.
“This man said he loved my mom,” she said. “He was a well-put-together man on the outside, but I was too young to know that he had a poker face.”
Fireall’s adult daughter, Emerald Turner, shared memories of her mother and told Marshall he had stripped her of an opportunity to make more.
“You were sentenced to 30 years,” she said. “But you sentenced her to death.”