A Campbell man found not guilty of murder while acting as his own attorney is still going to prison for nine years.

Forty-one-year-old Jermaine Bunn was sentenced Friday morning to serve time for tampering with evidence, weapons under disability and a parole violation.

From a small conference room at the Mahoning County Jail, Bunn sat down with 21 News exclusively to talk about the decision to represent himself as his own attorney in the fight of his life.

The Mahoning County man had just been released from prison back on April 3rd of 2016 when he attended a party on East Evergreen in Youngstown.

That night, shots rang out at the house party.

Bunn was struck by a bullet in the back of the head and rushed to the hospital.  

A man he describes as a long-time friend, Michael Pete, was tragically shot and killed.  

Bunn was charged with his murder.

"I stuck to what I said I was going to do.  I was going to free myself and I was going to uphold the honor of my friend, Mike Pete, and throughout this whole case that's what I did.  I never slandered his name.  I never told them what all those other people were saying throughout this whole case that he had a gun," Bunn said.

Unsatisfied with the defense attorney he paid to do the job, Bunn acted as his own attorney.

"I retained him and he didn't do nothing that I said do.  It's my life and I want you to fight it the way I want you to fight it," Bunn said.

Bunn refused to take responsibility for something he says he didn't do.

Bunn tells 21 News, "I might as well defend myself, because if I'm going to go down, I want to have my life in my own hands.  At the end of the day, I got 15 kids and I love every last one of my kids, and I'm going to fight for them more than I'm going to fight for myself.  I'm going to fight harder for them than I'm going to fight for myself."

A jury found him guilty of murder, and Bunn, who admits he has a history on the streets, felt prosecutors were ill-prepared to prosecute the case, feeling it wasn't properly investigated.

Nine people tested positive for gun shot residue, with at least four guns involved and 22 shell casings found. 

Bunn swears he did not come carrying a gun that day, and says he would have never hurt his friend.

"The victim's mother, that hurt more, because to see her going through that type of pain, and I understand you want someone to suffer for what happened to your son, but I didn't do that to your son," Bunn said.

However, the Mahoning County man knows well the pain of losing a loved one to murder.  

21 News did extensive coverage on Youngstown gangs back in 1995, including a series of gang reports that included the death of a young man who went by the name of Jinx.  

Jinx's real name was Kenneth Bunn Junior, and we interviewed him as he actually talked about the gang life and death.  

He was killed a short time later, on October 5th of 1995 in a hail of gun fire.  

Jermaine Bunn took it hard, saying word on the street and in the papers was that the killing was in retaliation for something he had done.

"It's very hard.  It's very hard.  I watched the pain in my mother's eyes.  My father drunk himself to death after because they couldn't take it, and I couldn't take it.  That's partially the reason why I started carrying guns because how they had put in the paper it was in retaliation for something I had done.  That does something to your family.  Some of my family members look at me like if it wasn't for you he wouldn't be dead.  So when I lost my brother it took a whole lot out of me.  I didn't know what to do," Bunn said.

Bunn just wants to thank the jury that sat through the case and gave him life for his kids, instead of life behind bars.

As for his children, he wants them to have hope, saying he plans to appeal the nine year sentence he received on other charges, and move forward with life so that he can finally be present as a father and put the past where it belongs.