Man Sentenced To 4 Life Terms For Killing 4 During Series Of Robberies In Ohio
AKRON, Ohio (AP) — A man was sentenced to four life terms without parole in a series of shooting deaths during robberies in Ohio about five years ago, including the death of a university student killed during a pizza shop robbery and a mother and son slain in their home.
Summit County Common Pleas Court Judge Alison McCarty sentenced 27-year-old Shaquille Anderson Friday to four consecutive sentences plus an additional 98 years in prison for his role in the murder of 21-year-old University of Akron student Zakaria Husein and three other people in robberies between December 2015 and June 2016.
"May these heartless acts weigh heavy on your heart," she told the defendant, who pleaded no contest and was convicted in Husein's death in February 2020. He agreed at the time to take the same step in the two other cases in exchange for life terms rather than the death penalty.
Sentences in all three cases, delayed for more than a year because of the pandemic, were imposed in separate hearings allowing relatives of the victims to speak either in person or by video. The Akron Beacon Journal reports that Anderson didn't speak due to his pending appeals and showed no emotion during the three hours of hearings.
Husein was killed during a December 2015 robbery at his family business, Premium New York Style Pizza. Surveillance video from inside the store showed a man wearing a mask demand money and shoot Husein before fleeing with the cash.
Ammar Husein, Zak's brother, said Anderson may have thought he had a tough life but it didn't compare to the conditions in Palestine, his family's native land.
"You were richer than everybody in the neighborhood where I came from," he said.
Sonia Freeman, 48, and her son Christopher Lane-Freeman, 28, were shot to death by three men during a May 2016 robbery in their West Akron apartment. Christian Dorsey, 24, was found shot to death on a street after a June 2016 robbery.
"May you rot behind prison walls for the rest of your life and have a painful death," said Roslyn Carter, cousin of Sonia Freeman and second cousin of Christopher Lane-Freeman. "We will forever live in pain ... You didn't have to do it but the devil in you made you."
Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh called the defendant "the worst of the worst," adding in a statement that his "reign of terror impacted several families who will feel the pain of what he did for years."
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