PALM BAY, Fla. – A couple originally facing murder charges in the shooting death of a 30-year-old man and the theft of his car last year in the Compound will be going to prison, but not for murder.
Rene Lemos and Robert Lanning took plea deals earlier this year, and Judge Aaron Peacock on Thursday sentenced them each to 18 years for being accessories.
After their arrests, Palm Bay police said Lemos and Lanning blamed each other for killing Nick Mitchell.
Assistant State Attorney Mike Doyle explained why prosecutors did not seek murder convictions in the case.
“They both gave credible stories that the killing and robbery and stealing of the car was the unplanned, unindicated, solo act of the other,” Doyle said.
Lemos took the stand at her sentencing hearing and told Peacock that she was under Lanning’s control and was too afraid to tell someone about what happened.
“I wish there was anything that I could have done differently to change it, and I wrack my brain every single day saying, ‘What if? Is there anything else that I could have done?’ And the answer is no,” she said.
The judge disagreed with her judgment.
“That was your one chance in this life to actually go out and do something for someone and you chose not to do that,” Peacock said.
Thursday was also the first time Mitchell’s family members talked publicly about the tragedy.
Peacock called Mitchell’s mom so she could address Lemos over the phone while Mitchell’s aunt, Sandra Christenson, was in court in person.
“That is a heart of stone, a heart of ice, and a murderer’s heart,” Christenson said of Lemos and Lanning. “I do know, without a shadow of a doubt, where my nephew Nicholas Mitchell resides. He’s in the arms of Jesus.”
The state attorney’s office did not wish to issue a statement on the case or be interviewed about not being able to prove who killed Mitchell.