Indiana
Boy, 16, gets 64 years in slaying of girl, 6
SOUTH BEND, Ind. (AP) — A 16-year-old boy convicted in the molestation and slaying of a 6-year-old northern Indiana girl was sentenced Friday to 64 years in prison.
St. Joseph Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Sanford sentenced Anthony Hutchens to 55 years for murder and nine years for child molestation, with the sentences to be served consecutively. The judge had convicted Hutchens in January on both felony counts following a bench trial.
Grace Ross was found dead in March 2021 in a wooded area near her home at an apartment complex in New Carlisle, west of South Bend. She had been strangled and molested and had blunt force injuries.
Sanford ordered Hutchens on Friday to be held in a juvenile detention facility until between his 18th and 21st birthdays. After that, his case will be reviewed and a determination will be made for if or how long he spends time in prison as an adult, the South Bend Tribune reported.
Hutchens will have to register as a sex offender following his release from prison.
An autopsy by a forensic pathologist found Grace’s cause of death to be homicide by asphyxiation and revealed blunt force injuries.
Hutchens, who was 14 at the time of Grace’s death, was tried as an adult. Following his conviction, Hutchens’ attorney said he would appeal the verdict based on his contention that the trial should have been held in juvenile court.
Wisconsin
Man gets 15 years for mall shooting
MILWAUKEE (AP) — A youth who was 15 when he shot and wounded eight people at a suburban Milwaukee mall in 2020 was sentenced Thursday to 15 years in prison.
Xavier Sevilla, now 18, pleaded guilty in January to five counts of first-degree reckless injury with a dangerous weapon. Five other criminal counts were dismissed as part of a plea deal.
Judge David Feiss granted Sevilla credit for three years’ time served. He also sentenced Sevilla to five years of extended supervision.
“I think the community needs to know that when a horrific assault is committed against the community, even by a 15-year-old child, that there will be incredibly difficult and large criminal consequences,” Feiss said.
Officers arrested Sevilla after stopping a car he was in. Prosecutors said investigators found a gun in the car with his fingerprints.
“What I did was violent, what I did was unnecessary, what I did was wrong,” Sevilla said in court. “I understand my actions have done irreversible harm to the community, the victims, their families and my own. I never want to cause pain like this again.”
Sevilla will be incarcerated until he is 30 years old.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled last June that Sevilla should be tried in adult court despite being 15 at the time of the shooting.
Florida
U.S. citizen gets 20 years for joining Islamic State group
MIAMI (AP) — A U.S. citizen who moved his family to Syria to join the Islamic State terrorist group has been sentenced to 20 years in federal prison.
Emraan Ali, 55, a U.S. citizen born in Trinidad and Tobago, was sentenced Tuesday in Miami federal court, according to court records. He pleaded guilty in November to conspiring to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization.
According to court records, Ali moved his family from Trinidad and Tobago to Brazil, and then to Turkey and eventually Syria in March 2015. He falsely told his children that they were going on vacation but actually intended to join IS, prosecutors said.
After arriving in Syria, IS registered Ali and his family, and Ali underwent IS religious and military training with other English speakers, officials said. The training included instruction on the operation of various automatic weapons such as the AK-47 assault rifle and PKC machine gun.
Ali was eventually discharged from combat duty and worked in residential construction for IS in the group’s then-de facto capital of Raqqa, investigators said. Ali also became a merchant and began buying and selling livestock, cars, weapons, weapons accessories and telephones to and from other IS members. Ali also provided money remitting services to other Trinidadian IS fighters in Syria and donated his own money to IS members to support the IS cause.
Ali and his family relocated within Syria several times over the years, officials said. Ali and his son, 22-year-old Jihad Ali, surrendered to Syrian Democratic Forces near Baghuz in March 2019, during the last sustained Islamic State group battles to maintain territory in Syria, officials said. They were later transferred to FBI custody and returned to the U.S. The son, who was born in New York and began IS military and religious training at 15 years old, was previously sentenced to five years in prison.
Despite their defeat in Syria in March 2019, the militant group’s sleeper cells still carry out deadly attacks in both Syria and Iraq where they once declared a “caliphate.”
Arizona
Man convicted of killing 4 people in Minnesota
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — A man has been convicted of killing four people in Minnesota and then leaving their bodies in an abandoned SUV in a Wisconsin cornfield.
Antoine Suggs, 39, of Scottsdale, Arizona, was found guilty Friday of four counts of second-degree murder in the September 2021 deaths of Nitosha Flug-Presley of Stillwater, 30; Jasmine C. Sturm, 30; Matthew Pettus, 26; and Loyace Foreman III, 35, all of St. Paul.
He will be sentenced on May 15.
Suggs testified that he shot the four in self-defense because he thought they were going to rob him, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported.
Prosecutors said his motive remains unclear but that Suggs meant to kill the victims after a night of drinking in St. Paul.
Suggs’ father, Darren McWright, who also goes by the last name Osborne, was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to helping his son hide the victims’ bodies.
Washington
Man charged with murder in deaths of missing mother and girl
VANCOUVER, Wash. (AP) — The man named as a person of interest in the disappearance of his ex-girlfriend and her 7-year-old daughter was charged with two counts of murder in their deaths, police in Washington state said Friday.
Detectives from the Vancouver Police Department booked Kirkland Warren for two counts of first-degree murder Friday after the Clark County Medical Examiner’s Office determined Meshay Melendez, 27, and her daughter, Layla Stewart, sustained gunshot wounds to their heads, according to a statement.
Warren was out on bail pending a long-delayed murder trial in Arkansas. When he was arrested in southwestern Washington early this month on charges that he assaulted Melendez and fired a gunshot into her apartment, he quickly posted bond and was released again.
The March 22 discovery of the bodies of the mother and daughter raised questions about why someone facing a murder charge in another state would be released from custody after being arrested in a serious domestic violence offense.
Warren was charged with killing an acquaintance in his vehicle in 2017 and leaving the body in a roadside ditch. He told police the passenger was asking him for money and that he shot him because he feared for his safety.
His family got him released from custody pending trial by putting up 10% of his $250,000 bond, said his attorney in that case, Mark Hampton. Warren subsequently moved to Washington with the knowledge of his lawyer and prosecutors.
Hampton didn’t return a phone message seeking comment on the new murder charges Friday. It was unclear if Warren, who was incarcerated in the Clark County Jail, had an attorney for the latest charges.
Warren’s March 2 arrest stemmed from a December episode during which police said he assaulted Melendez and then fired a gunshot into her apartment. He has pleaded not guilty to those charges.
Warren was the last person seen with the mother and daughter before they disappeared, authorities said. A friend told police she had been babysitting Stewart the night of March 11 when Warren arrived to pick her up. Melendez was unresponsive in the car, naked from the waist down.
The friend reported Melendez missing March 18. Melendez’s mother also reported her missing, saying the family had not heard from her for a week. The next day, police arrested Warren again. With his bail in Arkansas revoked and his bail in Washington increased to $1 million, he has been in custody since.
Alaska
Sex abuse case against ex-state attorney general thrown out
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — A judge dismissed a sex abuse case against former acting Alaska Attorney General Clyde “Ed” Sniffen, citing the statute of limitations in place when the alleged abuse happened over 30 years ago.
The case, thrown out on Friday, involved allegations that Sniffen, 58, sexually abused a then-17-year-old student in 1991 when he was 27 and the alleged victim’s coach of her high school’s mock trial competition team in Anchorage. Sniffen had pleaded not guilty.
Alaska does not currently have a statute of limitations in place for sexual abuse of minors. However, in an order on Friday, Superior Court Judge Peter Ramgren said that in 1991 there was a five-year limit on bringing charges of sexually abusing minors, the Anchorage Daily News reported. He said that changes made to the statute of limitations by state lawmakers for certain crimes in 1992 and 2001 did not apply to Sniffen’s case, siding with the defendant’s lawyer.
Sniffen was appointed Alaska’s top law enforcement officer by Republican Gov. Mike Dunleavy on Jan. 18, 2021, after his predecessor, Kevin Clarkson, resigned following allegations he sent unwanted text messages to a female state employee. But Sniffen himself resigned just 11 days after his appointment, citing personal reasons.
The Anchorage Daily News and ProPublica reported Sniffen’s resignation was announced as they were reporting on allegations of sexual misconduct with the Anchorage high school student three decades earlier. A grand jury indicted him on three felony counts of sexual abuse of a minor last year.
The alleged victim, Nikki Dougherty White, called the ruling a “huge disappointment” but said she did not regret going public with her story after learning that Sniffen had been appointed to the position.
“Because the truth is important,” White said. “And because Alaska has too long been a place that favors abusers, that does not provide a safe space for victims, for women, for girls, for anybody who doesn’t fit, you know, the white male profile.”
Illinois
Teacher charged with stalking Chicago mayor
CHICAGO (AP) — Prosecutors have accused a Chicago Public Schools teacher of stalking Mayor Lori Lightfoot.
WBBM-TV reported Sunday that the 36-year-old teacher has been charged with two felony counts of stalking and six misdemeanor counts including disorderly conduct and resisting arrest.
According to a complaint filed by the mayor, the teacher showed up at her home four or five times between Wednesday and Thursday. He questioned the size of the Chicago Police Department unit that protects her. He was asked to leave several times but kept coming back.
He’s due in court on April 6.
The Chicago Teachers Union issued a statement saying it does not condone violence and the charges should push the school district to create a safety plan for every school.
