A 23-year-old man pleaded guilty on Tuesday to conspiracy to commit first-degree assault in connection with a November 2024 shooting on West North Avenue that left a victim with gunshot wounds to both thighs, an elbow and the lower back. Donte Mack appeared before Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge John Addison Howard, who sentenced him to five years with all but two years suspended, followed by three years of probation.
The case traces back to November 11, 2024, when police received a ShotSpotter alert reporting a single round fired near the 2300 block of West North Avenue, according to Baltimore Witness. Officers dispatched to the block found no victim at the scene but recovered 16 spent 9mm shell casings along with a laser sight adapted for a firearm. Investigators were separately dispatched to Grace Medical Center, where a walk-in shooting victim had sought treatment — the same person struck during the North Avenue shooting.
According to the outlet’s reporting, the victim and a witness told police that an unknown suspect approached their parked 2012 Acura and opened fire from the passenger side and rear of the vehicle. The driver then took the wounded victim to Grace Medical Center, a facility at 2000 W. Baltimore Street that LifeBridge Health acquired in 2019 after it operated for a century as Bon Secours Hospital. Surveillance cameras allegedly captured Mack and two other suspects arriving at the scene seconds before the shooting and making a U-turn after pulling up.
From Attempted Murder to a Guilty Plea
Mack was arrested on January 15, 2025, alongside co-defendants Keon Brooks, 19, and Justin Griggs, 18, with Baltimore Police originally charging all three with attempted first-degree murder, per the Baltimore Police Department. The plea entered Tuesday represents a significant reduction from that initial charge, reflecting a case that dragged through more than a year of custody, procedural fights and repeated changes to the charging documents before reaching resolution just ahead of an August 2026 trial date…