Mother of murdered pregnant teen gets justice from beyond the grave, killer gets 90 years

Five years ago, pregnant 17-year-old Charinez Jefferson was executed in cold blood by a man who showed no mercy as she pleaded for the life of her unborn child.

Her mother Debbie died of cancer four months ago, but got justice from beyond the grave as her words helped sentence her daughter’s killer to 90 years behind bars.

Timothy Jones, 23, was sentenced on Monday for the teenager’s 2011 murder, which left her son Kahmani unable to breathe, talk, walk or see on his own.

Doctors were able to save the child although he was left severely disabled due to being deprived of oxygen after his mother was shot.

‘I watched you during the trial and you showed no remorse so maybe you wouldn’t know how I feel,’ Debbie told Jones in a statement to read by a prosecutor in court during the sentencing hearing, the Chicago Tribune reports.

‘From this day forward, when you open and close your mouth and eyes, and you are still able to walk and talk, stop and take a minute and think about the lives you destroyed.’

She added: ‘All of your sleepless nights and dreary days, I pray you ask God for forgiveness and to have mercy on your soul.’

Prosecutors said gang member Jones, then 18, had been angry after being shot in the thigh earlier that day in August 2011.

He saw a rival gang member with Jefferson in the 3000 block of West 64th Street in Chicago and approached them in a car.

Jones fired at him twice but missed and the man later leaving Jefferson alone.

And despite her desperate plea for Jones not to shoot, he callously cursed at her as he shot her eight times in the head and chest.

The teenager, whose other son was 16 months old at the time of the shooting, was pronounced dead afterwards, but doctors delivered her son via caesarean section.

‘She kept begging for her life and he still shot her, witness Romell VanTrease testified in Jones’ trial, the Tribune reports. ‘She said ‘I’m pregnant.’’

In a 2014 interview with the newspaper, Debbie said that doctors told her that Kahman would remain in a vegetative state forever and urged her to take him off life support.

But she refused, saying: ‘Who am I to judge whether he lives or dies? I was just grateful that he’s still here.’

And in the victim impact statement read after her death, she said: ‘Maybe with one more shot, you would have taken his life too.’

She added: ‘It’s kind of sad when his brother asks ‘Grandma, when is he going to get out of bed and play with me?’

‘You not only took my daughter’s life, you basically took his too.’

Jefferson’s aunt Betty Lee told Jones in court that she hopes the night he killed her ‘haunts you in the midnight hour.’

While Debbie said she had found a way to let go of the hatred and bitterness she felt, Lee said she didn’t think she would ever forgive Jones.

Source: The DailyMail