North Carolina Man Pleads Guilty, Sentenced to Life Without Parole in Murder of 5-Year-Old Cannon Hinnant

A North Carolina man accused of shooting and killing a 5-year-old boy in an unprovoked attack has avoided the death penalty by pleading guilty and will serve the rest of his life in prison without parole.

Darius Sessoms, 25, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder on Thursday at the Wilson County Courthouse for the August 2020 shooting of 5-year-old Cannon Hinnant in a case that a judge ruled in October would be tried as a capital murder case that brought a possible death sentence, WRAL-TV reported.

Darius Sessoms

Cannon Hinnant

Sessoms had been charged after prosecutors say he walked up to Cannon, his neighbor in Wilson, North Carolina, and shot him in the head at point-blank range as the boy rode his bike in front of his 7-year-old and 8-year-old sisters.

Cannon’s father, who owned the house where the young boy was playing in front of, said Sessoms was friendly with the Hinnant family and had been over to the house the night before to drink a beer.

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