'The worst case I've ever seen' - Judge gives 3 life sentences to man who killed child, girlfriend

[00:00:00] Mr. O'Neil: I am not sorry for something I didn't do, and I am not sorry for the things I did do. [00:00:14] Speaker 2: Mr. O'Neil, I'm not, listen, stop, listen to me, you're not going to raise your voice again. [00:00:22] Mr. O'Neil: I'm not going to raise my voice again. I'm not. [00:00:25] Speaker 2: I will have you removed from this courtroom. Mr. O'Neil, I consented you, without you being present, you don't conduct yourself. Mr. O'Neil, I understand, your honor. Thank you. [00:00:38] Mr. O'Neil: Mr. O'Neil, but I will say, I'm sorry for your loss. [00:00:45] Speaker 2: Mr. O'Neil, 19 years I've been at this job, I've seen human beings killed at the hands of others in every way imaginable. You name it, I've seen it. Shooting, stabbing, drownings, suffocating, blown apart by cars and DUI manslaughter cases. Horrible things. This is the worst case I have ever seen as far as the facts go. When the person from the fire department, when he testified, and when he said that he retrieved the body of Ronivia O'Neil from the home, and all he could do was sob, he took every ounce I had not to start sobbing too. Because there is no way any person with any feeling could have witnessed or seen the photos of what occurred that night and not be haunted for the rest of your life. I know I will be. For the rest of my life, I'll be haunted by what I saw as far as the evidence. The abject cruelty of it all. The abject cruelty. And I, you know, I was aware, because I reviewed a lot of the discovery ahead of time, as you well know, did a lot of the camera inspection of a lot of documents. And I was aware that there was some evidence, at least, that when you needed to recover from your gunshot wound, that neither your parents nor your Aisha, Ms. Robinson, would let you come recover at their home. I don't know if it's true or not. I'm just, I, okay, I'm not going to get into a dispute. I just, I'm just mentioning there was some evidence referencing that in the records. And all I can think about, because I know, I knew that Ms. Barron was not with you romantically at the time, and I knew that she just, out of the goodness of her heart, let you come stay with her. And it is beyond tragic that that critical decision ended in so much horror for her and for her children. It is unspeakably cruel what happened as a result of that one decision. The way that Ms. Barron died was horrific, and that 911 call, which captured truly all of it. I, you've heard, and everyone who's heard that 911 call, heard a death scream. If anybody ever wants to know what it sounds like before a human being dies, knowing that their death is imminent. That's exactly what it is. That was a death scream. [00:03:37] Mr. O'Neil: We don't see if it's true. [00:03:41] Speaker 2: But what happened to little Ranivya, and to little Ronnie, but I'm going to focus on Ranivya, because she was special. And you could tell Ms. Barron had done everything she could to create a beautiful home for her family. I noticed that Ranivya's bedroom, before you set it on fire, you could tell she tried so hard to make her feel like a princess. Kenyatta did everything she could. And I noticed, too, in the kitchen on the refrigerator, she put up magnets that said, "Faith, love, family, hope." And then, you know what else happened in that refrigerator during that night? It got splattered with blood all over it due to what happened. Little Ranivya, she couldn't scream. She couldn't run away. And she witnessed what you did to her mother for shooting her mother in the arm with a gunshot. She knew. And the horror that that child suffered. And she already had a life where she was born to challenges regarding her physical and her mental disabilities. But the pain and suffering that she suffered that night at your hands, unspeakable. Absolutely unspeakable. And at the moment, that first time you struck her with that hatchet, and little Ronnie testified that all he could see was tears coming out of his sister's face. At that moment, that child knew, she knew she was being betrayed in the cruelest, most tragic and sorrowful way that a child could ever be betrayed. She was being betrayed by her parent, the one person that should be there to protect their children and love them and keep them from harm. And that's what the last thing that child felt before she passed on from this earth was your utter cruel betrayal to her. And I read somewhere, and I don't know if it's true or not, I have no idea, but I read somewhere that souls pick their lives and that they know exactly how difficult their lives are going to be before they enter into this world. And I don't know if that's true or not, but if it is, Ranivia O'Neil is one of the bravest souls I have ever come across in my 54 years on this planet. One of the bravest ever, ever, because she suffered so traumatically.