Federico Cruz, a 44-year-year-old man who was sentenced to life in prison without parole for decapitating a teen in the 1990s, has been given a lighter sentence.
According to News 8, Cruz was resentenced Thursday to between 35 and 60 years in prison. He’s already served about 27 years for the murder of 17-year-old David Crawford in 1996. Cruz was 16 at the time of the murder.
News 8 reported that Cruz also recorded himself talking to and mutilating Crawford’s head.
“The video was so disturbing it wasn’t shown to the jury that convicted him,” said the outlet.
In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the Miller v. Alabama case “that mandatory sentencing schemes requiring children convicted of homicide to be sentenced to life imprisonment without parole violate the Eighth Amendment,” said Oyez. Then, the court ruled in the 2016 Montgomery v. Louisiana that the ruling applied retroactively.
Cruz was initially resentenced in 2018, but was granted another resentencing because an appeals court found his rights were violated, per News 8. According to the outlet, former Kent County prosecutor Bill Forsyth, who prosecuted the crime in 1996, said he thought giving Cruz a lighter sentence was a mistake.
“They’re being resentenced based on how they have behaved in prison for the last 20 or 30 years,” he said. “That’s troubling, in the sense, because it’s great that they behaved themselves in a controlled environment, but why are they entitled to be resentenced based on their prison behavior, and why not everybody else then?”
Judge Mark Trusock said in June that Cruz was mentally ill at the time of the killing and noted that he has tried to improve himself while in prison.
“I apologize again for taking David from you, for causing you so much harm that is unimaginable. I’m so sorry,” Cruz told the victim’s family Thursday.
While he did acknowledge that Cruz has made apparent progress in prison, Trusock also scolded the defense team for hiring an independent party to show a psychological evaluation of Cruz to the Crawford family. Per News 8, this move was unannounced and unsolicited.
“That is outrageous,” Trusock said. “I cannot believe that defense would do that. It is so inappropriate. There is no way that should be allowed. In my opinion that was clearly aimed at intimidating the witness from making a statement at sentencing here today.”
In addition to Kent County prosecutors, Crawford’s family is concerned about the new sentencing.
“I feel it is a great risk for this community for you to walk free,” Crawford’s sister, Kathryn Crawford, said to Cruz in court Thursday. “I will never forgive you for what you took away from our family.”
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