A teen convicted in the murder of a Department of Corrections officer was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years.
Felix Vasquez, 19, of Buckeye, was sentenced Aug. 29 in the October 2008 death of Officer Bradley Gerrard, according to Maricopa County Superior Court documents. He was convicted by a jury July 28 of first-degree murder, armed robbery, vehicle theft and arson after five days of trial.
Vasquez's accomplice, Benjamin Cannon, 18, also of Buckeye, was convicted in November 2009 of the same charges, and in January 2010 he also was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years, court records show.
According to police and court documents, Cannon and Vasquez, who were 15 and 16, respectively, killed Gerrard on Oct. 18, 2008, during a plot to steal a car so they could drive to a party in Goodyear.
Cannon was lying on a road in the Tartesso community in far west Buckeye about 11:30 p.m. when Gerrard drove by on his way home from a store, according to court testimony. Prosecutors said Vasquez shot Gerrard in the chest with a 12-gauge shotgun when he got out of his car to help Cannon.
The teens dumped a child car seat
and stroller, and then left for the party, court records state. They later dumped the gun in the desert and Gerrard's keys in a park trash can, and burned the car in the desert a few miles from where Gerrard was shot.
A passer-by discovered Gerrard's body about midnight in the median, a few blocks from his home. Police later found Gerrard's partially burned car, and arrested Cannon and Vasquez three days later.
Gerrard, 28, had a 2-year-old son and his wife, Susan, was pregnant with their second child. He apparently had gone to the store to buy an air mattress for a visiting relative and was returning home when he was killed.
He had worked for the Department of Corrections since 2004 and was assigned to the Arizona State Prison-Lewis near Buckeye.
Read more: http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2011/09/13/20110913buckeye-teen-gets-life-murder-corrections-officer.html#ixzz1Xs2aGqaN
Why are these losers up for parole in 25 years? An Arizona judge recently gave a repeated DUI offender with no other offenses then the DUI itself 99 years in prison to set an example for repeated offenses. This means driving drunk is more serious then murder. What an idiot for a judge.
That is pathetic. These dirt bags planned on killing someone, this was pre-meditated murder. Wow.
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