Man who left keys at scene of fatal San Leandro shooting gets 10 years, DA says there are ‘issues of proof’ in murder case

OAKLAND — More than two years after he was arrested and charged with murder, a Carmichael man has been sentenced to 10 years in state prison in a deal with prosecutors that allowed him to plead no contest to robbery, court records show.

Wavonte Oxner, 30, pleaded no contest to a single robbery charge, and in return prosecutors dismissed a murder count against him. He was formally sentenced in late June, court records show.

In March 2021, Oxner was charged with murdering and robbing 23-year-old Amari Laquan Matthews outside of the Little Namking restaurant on East 14th Street in San Leandro. Police alleged that Oxner and Matthews were in rival gangs, and that Oxner and his friends robbed Matthews of a gold chain, leading to a shootout between them and Matthews’ friends on Dec. 14, 2020.

At a change-of-plea hearing for Oxner in May, Deputy District Attorney Mark Bennett said there are “issues of proof as to whether Mr. Oxner was the actual shooter,” to explain why prosecutors weren’t pressing him to plead to manslaughter or murder.

Before Matthews died, he told a police officer that three men, all dressed in black, had attempted to rob him of jewelry but that he didn’t recognize them, according to court records. San Leandro police collected 31 shell casings from three different firearms at the scene of the shootout, according to police testimony.

Oxner was identified as a suspect in part because he dropped his car keys at the scene, then returned when police were processing the area and attempted to retrieve them. He allegedly described himself to investigators as a passerby who had run and taken cover when the shooting started.

Oxner remains in Santa Rita Jail in Dublin, pending transfer to the state prison system. He gets credit for the two years and four months he’s spent behind bars awaiting a resolution to his case. At his next court date in August, a judge will determine how much restitution he must pay, but Oxner will not be required to attend, court records show.