A Fairbanks man convicted of killing one man and wounding another in a 2021 shooting at a local Safeway was sentenced this week to serve 85 years in prison.
Joshua Eric Butcher, now 44, shot a customer outside and then walked into the Fairbanks store on Airport Road in November 2021 and sprayed the store with bullets from a 9 mm handgun, according to charging documents filed in the case.
Harley Ray Titus, 41, was killed as he left the store. A Safeway employee was shot in the foot, according to the Fairbanks Police Department.
Butcher pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in March 2024 as part of a plea agreement that amended a first-degree assault charge to third-degree assault and dismissed several other charges.
On Tuesday, Fairbanks Superior Court Judge Patricia Haines sentenced Butcher to serve 75 years on the murder charge as well as two 5-year sentences for two assault charges, with credit for time served. Haines also ordered more than $56,800 in restitution to be paid to a claims management service.
The hearing included six people considered victims of the shooting, according to a transcript of the proceedings.
Haines before handing down the sentence described the extraordinary seriousness of the crime, which involved the death of a man who was a stranger to Butcher, according to the transcript.
Butcher also made a number of posts on social media including one a few weeks earlier about public shootings that the judge described as “chilling,” the transcript said. She also said he was mentally ill and experiencing psychosis at the time, it said.
Butcher remained jailed at Fairbanks Correctional Center on Wednesday.