By New York Post (U.S.) | Created at 2024-11-26 02:16:06 | Updated at 2024-11-27 16:58:03
1 day ago
The white Florida woman who gunned down her black neighbor, a mother of four young kids, over a long-running dispute about the children playing outside her home was sentenced to 25 years in prison Monday.
Susan Lorincz, 60, claimed she was acting in self-defense when she shot and killed 35-year-old Ajike “A.J.” Owens, but the judge — and the all-white jury in Ocala, Fla., who found her guilty — didn’t buy her excuse.
“The shooting was completely unnecessary in this case,” Circuit Judge Robert Hodges said during an afternoon hearing. “The shooting, I find, was based more in anger than in fear.”
Lorincz was convicted of manslaughter in August for the shooting death of Owens, after she fatally shot the single mother through her front door on June 2, 2023.
The two had argued for years over Owens’ kids playing in a grassy area near both of their homes.
On the day of the shooting, Owens was yelling and banging on Lorincz’s door after her children said the woman chucked an umbrella and roller skates at them — which Lorincz denied.
After Lorincz shot Owens through the door once with her .389-caliber handgun, she told police she feared for her life.
But jurors disagreed as evidence of an at least three-year-long dispute between the neighbors was presented at trial.
In a 911 call over a previous dispute, Lorincz told the operator, “I’m just sick of these children.” And officers had responded to at least a dozen calls related to the ongoing feud since January 2021.
Other neighbors said they overheard Lorincz say “nasty things” to the children and that she was always angry that kids were playing on the field near her home.
The jury took less than three hours to convict Lorincz. She faced a maximum of 30 years behind bars, but Hodge showed some leniency on account of evidence that the 60-year-old suffered from mental health issues and had been abused as a child.
Lorincz apologized to Owens’ family in a statement to the judge but stuck by her self-defense stance, saying she was “literally terrified” of the mom.
“I so wish I could go back and change things so she was still here,” Lorincz said. “I never intended to kill anyone.”
Owens’ children, some of whom witnessed their mother’s horrific killing, are now in the sole care of their grandmother, Pamela Dias, who said they are all still traumatized.
“We’re hurting with a pain that will never, never go away,” Dias said. “There’s a hole in our heart that will never mend. Susan [Lorincz] destroyed our family.”
The judge also noted the impact of Lorincz’s deadly actions on the four siblings.
“They’ll live their whole lives without their mother, which I think is a very significant harm inflicted by Ms. Lorincz,” Hodges said.
The case drew outrage and protests among the Black community in Ocala — about 80 miles northwest of Orlando — after it took prosecutors weeks to charge Lorincz.
