Sentencing

Rachael Mullenix, the Huntington Beach teenager who conspired with her love-struck boyfriend to murder her mother and dump the slashed body into Newport Harbor, expressed only grudging and limited remorse Friday as a judge sentenced her to 25 years to life in prison. "I don't care what the jury thought. I did not do that to my mother," Mullenix, 19, told Orange County Superior Court Judge David Thompson. "I can't even believe this is happening to me."

We got another dog right away. That wasn't the plan. But back in March, less than two weeks after Rex died and when I still had faint bruises from digging my fingers into my forehead amid uncontrollable sobs, I signed us up to "foster" a Saint Bernard mix that had been rescued from a crack den. It was a classic rebound move, but the unbearable silence of the dogless house was too much to take. You don't realize how much a dog's presence defines the contours of your home until, in its absence, the walls seem to relocate themselves.

Two 17-year-old girls have been sentenced for torturing and butchering an elderly woman, less than three weeks after a pair of 10-year-olds were charged with murdering a toddler. Again, a troubled nation is asking, how could this happen? Edna Phillips, 70, was throttled with her dog's leash and stabbed or slashed 86 times. The mental images of the crime have shocked the nation just as the video pictures of little James Bulger being led to his death did last month.

Behind an unassuming storefront in Orange County's Little Saigon, prosecutors say, was the driving force behind an illicit international trade in rhinoceros horns. Vinh Chuong "Jimmy" Kha and Felix Kha may never have journeyed to the savannas of Africa, but by trafficking in hundreds of pounds of the prized horns that some Vietnamese and Chinese believe can cure cancer, the father and son were responsible for the hundreds of rhinos targeted by poachers, prosecutors said. "Their fingers might as well have been on the triggers of poachers' guns," Assistant U.S. Atty.

An identical twin whose plot to kill her sister made headlines around the world sobbed uncontrollably Friday as a judge sentenced her to 26 years to life in prison. Despite her emotional, last-minute protest of innocence, Jeen "Gina" Han, 24, dubbed "the evil twin," received the maximum sentence. "It is obvious Miss Han is a danger to society, particularly her own family," said Orange County Superior Court Judge Eileen C. Moore. "All of her family have been victims of her crimes."

Rapper-actor Snoop Dogg will avoid jail time after pleading no contest Wednesday to two felony charges -- but he might be legally allowed to continue smoking marijuana. The entertainer, whose real name is Calvin Broadus, entered the plea to a charge of gun possession by a convicted felon and a marijuana-related drug charge, prosecutors said. Dogg, 35, appeared before Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Terry Smerling in Pasadena clad in a leather jacket, black jeans and a T-shirt.

The leader of the Narragansett tribe, Chief Sachem Matthew Thomas, was ordered to perform 150 hours of community service for brawling with state troopers during a police raid on a tribal smoke shop in Charleston. The sentencing ends a case that began five years ago after tribal members fought with state police who were shutting down a shop on tribal land that was selling cigarettes without collecting state taxes.

A federal judge in Chicago delayed sentencing for convicted fundraiser Antoin "Tony" Rezko as one of his lawyers said he was working with prosecutors in hopes of getting a reduced prison term. Sentencing is now set for Dec. 16. "We are trying to work toward an agreement that would affect sentencing," attorney Bill Ziegelmueller said after the hearing. Rezko was a major political fundraiser who bankrolled campaigns of Sen. Barack Obama and Democratic Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich. He did not supply any money to Obama's current campaign, and the Democratic presidential nominee has not been accused of wrongdoing.

Sprinter Houston McTear failed to appear in Santa Monica Superior Court for sentencing in a cocaine-sales case, prompting Judge James Albracht to issue an arrest warrant. McTear previously had pleaded guilty to the charge and had been free on bail pending sentencing. He had been arrested for allegedly selling cocaine in a Santa Monica park.

A San Diego woman who escaped from a Michigan prison more than 30 years ago and remade her life as a suburban mother pleaded guilty to escape after a judge said he would give her probation. Susan LeFevre, 53, was in court for a routine hearing on the escape charge. But that changed after the unexpected offer from Wayne County Circuit Judge Leonard Townsend, defense attorney William Swor said. Sentencing is set for Sept. 24. LeFevre must serve at least 5 1/2 years on the drug charge that led to her original sentence before a chance at parole.

JOINT BASE LEWIS-McCHORD, Wash. - Army Sgt. John Russell opened fire on U.S. mental health workers at a combat stress center in Iraq out of revenge after doctors said he was not eligible to leave the Army, prosecutors said Monday at the opening of Russell's court-martial on charges of premeditated murder. Five U.S. servicemen were shot to death at the Camp Liberty clinic in 2009. The defense claims that Russell suffered from chronic stress and mental illness that flamed into a psychotic fury.

Lauryn Hill's sentence in her tax-evasion case has been postponed to May 6 because the singer had not yet paid restitution on the money she owes. She now has a two-week reprieve to gather the funds. The eight-time Grammy winner appeared in a New Jersey federal court Monday to receive her sentence on charges of not paying taxes on $1.8 million in earnings. She had entered a guilty plea to three counts of tax evasion in June 2012, admitting that she intentionally failed to file tax returns in 2005, 2006 and 2007.

When the casket that was supposed to hold the earthly remains of Jim Davis was finally lowered into the ground, the only thing missing was the late Mr. Davis. The coffin had been weighed down to simulate the approximate heft of a corpse. And Jim Davis was not inside the box. Federal prosecutors said the phony funeral was among the inventive tricks that Jean Crump - a onetime Long Beach mortician - used to loot insurance companies out of hundreds of thousands of dollars. On Tuesday, she was sentenced to 18 months in federal prison.

Two Silicon Valley men were sentenced Monday for a "sextortion" plot in which they tried to extort professional poker players with threats of publicizing naked photographs and other private information stolen from email accounts. Tyler Schrier, 23, of Menlo Park was sentenced to 42 months in prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy, extortion and unauthorized access to a protected computer to obtain information. As part of the plea, Schrier admitted he also extorted $26,000 from professional poker players in another plot.

A former bookie was sentenced Thursday to two years in federal prison for his role in a scheme to bribe basketball players at the University of San Diego. Richard Francis Garmo, 43, of El Cajon, was the eighth and last defendant to be sentenced in San Diego federal court after an investigation the FBI called Operation Hook Shot. Garmo and his co-defendants allegedly induced Brandon Johnson, the school's all-time leading scorer, to take bribes so that gamblers could win bets in Las Vegas.

A member of the LulzSec hacker group was sentence to a year in federal prison Thursday as a result of his involvement with a cyberattack in 2011. The U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ordered Cody Andrew Kretsinger, a 25-year-old Decatur, Ill., resident to also serve a year of home detention after he completes his time in prison. He will also be required to perform 1,000 hours of community service and pay more than $605,000 in restitution. Kretsinger, who went by the name of "recursion" during his days with LulzSec, pleaded guilty last year to conspiracy and unauthorized impairment of a protected computer in connection with the hacker group's attack on Sony Pictures Entertainment's computer systems in May and June 2011.

Rapper T.I. pleaded guilty in Atlanta on Thursday to federal weapons possession charges, and will receive a sentence that includes prison time after he completes a period of community service. In the year that he is awaiting sentencing, T.I., whose real name is Clifford Harris, must complete 1,500 hours of community service, at least 1,000 of them talking to youth groups about the pitfalls of guns, gangs and drugs. Harris, 27, whose sixth album debuted at No. 1 on the sales charts last July, pleaded guilty to possession of unregistered machine guns and silencers, unlawful possession of machine guns and possession of firearms by a convicted felon.

A young woman whose diary entries told of her fear of her ex-boyfriend and helped convict the man of her murder were read in court again Friday as he was sentenced to more than 100 years in prison. "I swear to God that I hate Richard Namey," Sarah Jane Rodriguez had scrawled on a scrap of paper days before she was shot to death. "I hope he goes to prison for life. He is just so very mean to me."

A San Bernardino County physician's assistant who pleaded guilty to illegally distributing a widely abused painkiller was sentenced Tuesday to 14 years in federal prison. Christopher Henry Lister, 51, of Victorville ran a mobile health clinic called Lister's Mobile Health Services, and sold prescriptions for OxyContin to "street-level" drug dealers, prosecutors alleged in court papers. Lister pleaded guilty in November to one count of conspiracy to distribute and attempt to distribute oxycodone, the generic name for OxyContin, according to a plea agreement filed in U.S. District Court in Riverside.

Full Tilt Poker founder Raymond Bitar, accused of using online player funds to finance his company in what prosecutors called a Ponzi scheme, pleaded guilty but was spared from serving time in prison because he needs a heart transplant. U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska on Monday approved a plea agreement between Bitar, 41, and prosecutors, sentencing him to the seven days he served in jail last year, after saying a prison sentence would kill him. Bitar, who participated in a hearing in Manhattan federal court by video link from Los Angeles, near his home, pleaded guilty to two felonies that carry a maximum sentence of 35 years in prison.