PONTIAC (AP) — A man who said he felt threatened when he shot another man from the top of a gas station in 1969 has won a shorter sentence and will leave prison after roughly 50 years.
“Thank you,” Robert Cook, 68, told an Oakland County judge last Friday.
In 1971, Cook was sentenced to life in prison for murder. But he was eligible for a new hearing decades later due to a series of U.S. Supreme Court decisions that struck down automatic life sentences for minors.
There’s no dispute that Cook, who was 17, shot a man in Pontiac in 1969. He said he was targeted by a motorcycle gang after stopping two members from sexually assaulting a woman, The Oakland Press reported.
“The prosecutor wants you to think that this was a cold-blooded killing. That’s not true. ... I stopped him from getting me first,” Cook told Judge Martha Anderson.
The prosecutor’s office opposed a shorter punishment. But Anderson sentenced Cook to 40 years in prison, making him immediately eligible for parole.
The judge said Cook lacked “structure and guidance” as a teenager and followed the wrong people.
“Don’t make me regret my decision,” Anderson said, wishing Cook luck.
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