San Ramon man with prior manslaughter conviction takes 15 years in plea deal over San Leandro killing

OAKLAND — A San Ramon man has accepted a manslaughter conviction and 15-year plea deal in the 2018 shooting death of a Berkeley man who prosecutors say was robbed and shot during a marijuana deal in San Leandro.

Marcel Rutherford-Chew, 28, pleaded no contest to voluntary manslaughter in the shooting death of 43-year-old Eric Allen Sr. In exchange for the plea, prosecutors dismissed murder, assault and robbery charges against him, court records show. Rutherford-Chew is scheduled to be formally sentenced to 15 years — with four years credit for time served in jail awaiting trial — on Nov. 11.

Rutherford-Chew’s co-defendant, Jeffrey Hamilton, pleaded no contest to an assault with a deadly weapon charge and has been released from jail. Both deals were entered into the record on Sept. 12.

Rutherford-Chew’s criminal record includes a near-identical incident in March 2012, when two of his friends — 24-year-old Vedell Chew of Fairfield and 18-year-old Bernard Knight of East Palo Alto — were killed in a shootout resulting from an alleged marijuana robbery outside an apartment complex in Fairfield. Rutherford-Chew was initially charged with murder under the provocative act doctrine — which allows prosecutors to charge instigators of a crime where the victim kills another person in self-defense — but in 2013 he accepted a plea deal and three-year prison term for involuntary manslaughter.

In Allen’s death, witnesses testified that he and a family member met up with Rutherford-Chew and Hamilton outside an apartment complex on the 1500 block of Mono Street in San Leandro at around 1:30 p.m. on Oct. 15, 2018. Allen, a security guard, brought a pistol to the transaction. At some point, the two suspects allegedly brandished guns and robbed Allen, resulting in a shootout where Allen was struck by gunfire and killed.

Rutherford-Chew was arrested the following month when he appeared at a probation meeting in San Mateo stemming from a conviction for possessing guns in a rap music video shoot and gang activity, court records show. He has been in jail ever since.