A St. Louis man was sentenced Monday to 25 years in prison for a 2023 shooting that killed 19-year-old Kobe Dotson, a case that ended with a family member charging at the defendant in the courtroom before a deputy stopped her with a taser. Clyde Sanders, 38, had struck a plea deal with prosecutors just days earlier.
According to firstalert4.com, Sanders entered the plea deal on Friday, September 25, 2026, and was sentenced on Monday, September 28, 2026, three calendar days later in St. Louis. As part of the agreement, he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, a charge amended down from first-degree murder, along with armed criminal action. Prosecutors dismissed nine other charges as part of the deal, the outlet reported.
The shooting that killed Dotson happened on April 25, 2023, in the 2800 block of Chippewa, per the same account. The charges state that Sanders approached Dotson and three other teens and demanded they return something he had lost. When the group tried to drive away in a truck, Sanders opened fire, killing Dotson. The truck crashed afterward, and Dotson was ejected from the vehicle, the report states.
A Courtroom Confrontation During Sentencing
Roughly 20 of Dotson's family members packed the courtroom for Sanders' sentencing, the report notes. Near the end of the proceeding, a family member shouted and charged at Sanders. A city sheriff's deputy fired a taser to stop the woman and others from getting closer to him. No one appeared to be injured in the incident, according to the same account.
Amid the tension, Dotson's sister addressed the court, saying her anger could never outlast her love for her brother. The moment offered a rare note of grief amid the outburst that briefly disrupted the sentencing.
Charging Details Show a Conflict on Sanders' Age
The 38-year-old age cited in Monday's sentencing report differs from an earlier account. When Sanders was first charged in 2023, KSDK reported he was 34 years old at the time. The discrepancy between the two reported ages has not been resolved.
Sanders' armed criminal action plea falls under Missouri's statute covering the use of a weapon during a felony, according to the Missouri Revisor of Statutes. The provision, RSMo section 571.015, is titled 'Armed criminal action, offense of — penalty,' though the available text does not specify how the 25-year sentence was divided between Sanders' two guilty pleas.
For Dotson's family, the sentencing closed out a case that began with a confrontation over a lost item and ended in a teenager's death on a South St. Louis street more than three years ago. Sanders was sentenced to 25 years Monday.
