A New Boston man was sentenced to life in prison without parole after a jury convicted him of two counts of capital murder in the July 2024, shooting deaths of two teens.
The jury found that on July 6, 2024, Malaki Beckham, intended to rob Princeton Washington and Nicholas Webster, both 19, for guns during an exchange at the Dogwood Plaza Apartments in New Boston.
Evidence in the three-day trial showed that Beckham had been trying to purchase a handgun in the days prior to the shooting.
Five days before the deaths, he robbed a Hooks man of a Glock .40 caliber handgun which he then tried to get rid of after a police report was filed for the robbery. An Instagram post showing the Glock and another handgun caught the attention of Washington and a conversation via text and video messaging began about a firearms exchange.
Rondarrius Evans told the jury that, prior to meeting the two teens, Beckham had told him that he wanted to rob them but that he did not intend to participate if that plan went into action.
Video footage from a home surveillance camera showed the four men meeting up and Washington falling to the ground from what turned out to be a gunshot wound to the chest. Footage from another angle showed Evans and Beckham running toward an apartment in the complex and then Beckham running back toward the scene. He was seen bending down to pick something up and then entering Washington’s car before fleeing the scene.
Beckham was found five days later in Red River County with an AR-P assault pistol which had been shown by video footage shown to the jury to had been in Webster’s possession prior to the shooting.
Following the trial, Beckham was remanded to the custody of Bowie County Sheriff’s Office while awaiting transport to serve his sentence in a Texas Department of Criminal Justice prison.
Evans is facing two counts of murder in connection to the shootings. His trial is set for March 24, 2026.
