Travis Jones, formerly Staten Island's 'most wanted,' pleads guilty to shooting

Staten Island Advance/Michael OatesTravis Jones, center, who prosecutors say shot another man over the score of a basketball game in Rosebank, surrendered at District Attorney Daniel Donovan's office in March.

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- A fugitive gunman who shot a man over the score of a basketball game in Rosebank has decided to face the music, just a few months after he turned himself in upon seeing his photo in the Advance.
Travis Jones, 21, will spend the next five years in prison, as part of a deal he brokered with prosecutors this week.
Jones had been on the run since June 1, 2008, when he shot Carleak Gibbons, a city Sanitation worker, during an argument over a basketball game at the Kaltenmeier Playground on Virginia Avenue in Rosebank.
On Feb. 20, the Advance ran Jones’ photo as part of a story featuring District Attorney Daniel Donovan’s 10 most wanted fugitives. Jones saw the photo, prosecutors said, and turned himself in two weeks later.
"For the past three years.... he’s sleeping with one eye open. He had to always be looking over his shoulder," Donovan said.
On Tuesday, he pleaded guilty to first-degree assault, the top charge on his original indictment — first-degree assault is the same level of violent felony as attempted murder, which he had also been charged with.
Gibbons, who’s now 33, told the Advance in March that he’s moved on since the shooting: "Let justice do what it do. ... I have no beef. I forgave."
Donovan said he’s pleased with the five-year deal, noting the victim’s conciliatory attitude and Jones’ otherwise clean record.
"This guy has no criminal record. He was never even arrested before this incident," Donovan said.
Jones, it turns out, wasn’t even playing in the basketball game that sparked the shooting. He was supposed to be keeping score, Gibbons recalled, and he had gotten the score wrong.
That sparked an argument, and Jones left the court, then came back in a black Dodge Charger a few minutes later with a friend – and a gun. He fired a half-dozen shots, prosecutors said, hitting Gibbons once in the stomach.
A grand jury indicted Jones in connection with the shooting on Dec. 29, 2008, charging him with second-degree attempted murder, first- and second- degree assault, two counts of second-degree criminal possession of a weapon and first-degree reckless endangerment.
He remains held on $250,000 bail until his sentencing date on June 23.
Anyone with information about the remaining nine suspects on the most-wanted list is asked to call the Richmond County District Attorney’s Tip Line at 718-556-7030.Tipsters can remain anonymous.
Donovan’s office is offering a $1,000 reward for any tip that leads to an arrest.