A Tennessee man who was just 15 years old when he murdered a fellow teen while they were sniffing glue together has died in state custody, The Tennessean reports.
On Thursday, the Tennessee Department of Correction disclosed that Ethen Vanderpool, now 20, died Saturday at the Northwest Correctional Complex. Authorities have not released a cause of death.
Vanderpool was serving a 22-year prison sentence after being convicted last year of second-degree murder for the 2018 death of 16-year-old JayShawn Taylor.
The sentence was handed down in January and Vanderpool was transferred to the facility in Tiptonville in February from the Wilson County Jail.
On November 15, 2018, Vanderpool fatally shot Taylor while they were with two girls sniffing glue at Vanderpool’s home in Wilson County. Prosecutors initially charged Vanderpool as a juvenile but his case was later moved to adult court in March 2019.
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Text messages presented at trial showed that Vanderpool was concerned about Taylor being at his home. Even so, Vanderpool took out a gun during the gathering and let Taylor hold it.
At some point, the gun fell onto the floor under a bed, and when one of the girls tried to retrieve it, Vanderpool got angry for how Taylor looked at the girl. Vanderpool grabbed Taylor’s shirt and forced him onto a bed before shooting him fatally.
Vanderpool was being home-schooled at the time, although he had been enrolled in Wilson County schools previously. Taylor was a junior at Mt. Juliet High School.
Taylor’s brother, Jalan Sowell, said last year that he remembers his sibling in the best of light.
“A shooting star,” Sowell told WKRN-TV. “Because they’re here quick, you see them, but then they’re just gone. I feel like I should have taken more time admiring that shooting star, because he was special, and you see he still has an effect on all of us now.”
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[Feature Photo: Ethen Vanderpool/Wilson County Jail]
