Proclaiming their innocence, two admitted drug dealers were sentenced to life in prison yesterday for the murder of a 23-year-old addict who prosecutors said was killed over a $100 drug debt near the city’s Italian Like park.
Glenn D. Taylor, 43, of Arrow Road, and Mwandishi G. Mitchell, 31, of the 100 block of South 14th Street, were found guilty of second-degree murder, kidnapping, conspiracy and other offenses in the Nov. 1, 2000, shooting of Haydee Freytes, 23.
At their request, judge Lawrence F. Clark Jr. immediately imposed the mandatory life terms without the possibility of parole.
Clark added consecutive sentences of 5 to 20 years for the other offenses.
Before they were sentenced, both men said they had nothing to do with the crime and vowed appeals.
‘There is a lot of work yet to be done,” Taylor said, “This was just a battle and the war has yet to be won.”
Freytes’ grandmother, Hayde Pajan, told the court the victim’s two children still ask for her.
“I feel that justice was done,” she told Clark. “Now she can rest in peace.”
During the trial, an admitted prostitute and drug addict testified that she was with Taylor, Mitchell and two others when they picked up Freytes at a North Third Street intersection.
The witness, whose name is being withheld by The Patriot-News, said the men beat Freytes while driving to Italian Lake, where they dragged her from the car. The witness said she heard gunshots as she fled.
Freytes was shot in the head and the hand.
Defense attorneys Justin McShane and Sanford Krevsky suggested the witness was lying to get out of a lengthy prison term on drug and prostitution charges.
Her testimony was inconsistent with the evidence. She said the victim was wearing a yellow sun dress, but Freytes was wearing jeans and a dark shirt.
The victim bore no scars or bruises from the beating the witness described.
She didn’t come forward until April 29, 2002, when she was incarcerated on parole violations, the attorneys pointed out.
The jury sided with First District Attorney Francis T. Chardo, who said the eyewitness’ account was supported by other testimony that showed Freytes had stolen drugs off Mitchell and told others she was refusing to pay him.
Testimony showed that Mitchell had offered $200 to anyone who was willing to beat up Freytes.
Jailhouse informants also testified the men talked about the slaying.
Chardo said her disrespect toward the two dealers led them to kill her.
“They killed Haydee Freytes because she stole their money and then taunted them,” Chardo told the jury in closing arguments Monday.
The jury deliberated more than 20 hours over three days before reaching a verdict.
Chardo said the jury’s verdict was insightful, because no one knows which defendant fired the fatal shots. Second-degree murder holds those who take part in a crime that results in murder responsible for the slaying.
Chardo commended city detective Donald Heffner and other investigators in the case.
“Rather than discarding this case as the murder of a junkie, they treated Haydee Freytes with the dignity and respect that the defendants denied her,” Chardo said.
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