LANSING (WWJ) A Lansing man was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the murder of 2-year-old Wynter Cole-Smith.
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced Rashad Maleek Trice, 27, was also sentenced Friday in Ingham County’s 30th Judicial Circuit Court to a concurrent 60 to 90 years behind bars for the assault of Wynter’s mother. He pled guilty in July to one count of First-Degree Murder and Criminal Sexual Conduct.
According to a criminal complaint obtained by WWJ Newsradio 950; on Sunday, July 2nd 2023, Trice got into an argument about money with Wynter’s mother at her Lansing apartment. He stabbed her and sexually assaulted her, the complaint said. She and Trice shared a one-year-old son, but Trice was not Wynter's father.
Trice kidnapped Wynter and drove away in a stolen Chevy Impala in the middle of the night, the complaint said. Authorities issued an Amber Alert early Monday morning. Later that day, authorities arrested Trice in Saint Clair Shores after a pursuit. Wynter was not with him.
Federal, local, county and state law enforcement agents assisted in the search for Wynter, from Lansing to Detroit.
Two days later, investigators found Wynter’s body near the Coleman A. Young International Airport in downtown Detroit. Her cause of death was listed as strangulation.
The Michigan Attorney General’s Department charged him with twenty counts in connection to the crimes. However; Nesel, and the prosecutors of Wayne County (Kym Worthy), Ingham County (John Dewane) and Macomb County (Peter Lucido) worked together to consolidate the charges.
Because Trice was initially charged in the federal jurisdiction with kidnapping a minor and kidnapping resulting in death; he was, at one point, eligible to be sentenced to death despite the fact that Michigan had abolished capital punishment more than a century ago. However, in October of 2023, the feds announced they would not seek the death penalty against him.
“Nothing can bring Wynter back, but I hope knowing that Mr. Trice will spend the rest of his life behind bars, without the need for a lengthy trial, offers some solace to her loved ones,” Nessel said of Trice’s life sentence. “Thanks to the tireless work of law enforcement and prosecutors in my office, the man responsible for these horrific acts will never again endanger our communities.”