Killer gets reduced sentence, will still serve life

Baltimore man shot correctional officer guarding him

Maryland's second-highest court removed on Thursday 50 years from the sentence of a prisoner convicted of killing a correctional officer during his 2006 attempted escape from a hospital.

But the Court of Special Appeals still left Brandon T. Morris of Baltimore serving life in prison without the possibility of parole — followed by 227 years instead of 277. The court upheld his 22 convictions, including for first-degree murder in the slaying of Jeffery Wroten, who was guarding him at Washington County Hospital.

Morris, who was serving seven years at Roxbury Correctional Institution for armed robbery and assault, had been taken to the hospital after stabbing himself with a needle, court records said. Wroten was guarding Morris overnight. According to testimony at Morris's 2008 trial, Morris shot Wroten in the face with the officer's state-issued revolver.