A Florida woman who fatally shot her neighbour through her front door last year has been sentenced to 25 years in prison.
The fatal shooting followed a series of quarrels between Lorincz and Owens that resulted in police being called at least six times from January 2021.
“I panicked and I thought, ‘Oh my God, she’s really going to kill me this time,’ you know,” Lorincz told Marion County Sheriff’s investigators.
Addressing the court on Monday, Lorincz denied calling Owens’s children racial slurs and said the shooting was “not about race”.
The night I shot that gun I was confused as to why she was screaming and pounding on my door,” she told the court.
A Florida woman who shot her neighbor dead through her front door last year received a 25-year prison sentence.
Ajike “AJ” Owens, 35, was shot by Susan Lorincz, 60, when she knocked on her locked door in Ocala during a fight over the victim’s kids playing outside.
Before the shooting on June 2, 2023, Lorincz, who is white, yelled racial epithets at Owens’s black children, according to an affidavit and Owens’s family.
For one count of assault and one count of manslaughter with a firearm, Lorincz was found guilty by a jury in August. Stand Your Ground laws in Florida, which allow the use of lethal force in self-defense, were put to the test during the trial.
After a string of arguments between Lorincz and Owens that led to at least six police calls starting in January 2021, the fatal shooting occurred.
The altercation is thought to have started earlier in the day when Lorincz yelled at Owens’ kids and hit one of them with a roller skate.
Lorincz was inside her house when she fired a handgun, hitting Owens, a single mother of four, in the chest.
Although she did not testify during her trial, she told investigators that when Owens came to her door, she had feared for her life.
The Marion County Sheriff’s investigators heard Lorincz say, “I panicked and I thought, ‘Oh my God, she’s really going to kill me this time,’ you know.”.
I only remember firing the gun, not really picking it up. “,”.
Jurors were told by her attorneys that she had “no choice”.
Judge Robert Hodges, however, stated during Monday’s sentencing that “she was safe at the time she fired the gun through the door” and that the shooting was motivated “more by anger than fear.”.
The abuse Lorincz experienced as a child and her diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) were recognized by Judge Hodges as mitigating factors.
However, he decided that this did not warrant a significant reduction in her 20-year maximum sentence.
Speaking to the court on Monday, Lorincz claimed that the shooting was “not about race” and denied using racial epithets against Owens’ children.
“I sincerely regret taking AJ’s life. I had no intention of killing her. She testified in court, “I didn’t understand why she was yelling and beating on my door the night I shot that gun.”.
“I sincerely apologize for this tragedy and ask that you accept my humility. “,”.
