PORTLAND — The third and final suspect in a 2019 killing of a man who was shot while collecting cans in North Portland was sentenced to 20 years in prison, court officials said Wednesday.
Aaron Criswell, who was 15 at the time of the incident, pleaded guilty to charges of murder, robbery and burglary.
Two other teens, Eugene Woodruff and Richard Rand IV, who were 14 and 15, respectively, at the time of the shooting, took plea deals last year and were sentenced to 20 years each. Due to juvenile sentencing laws none of the three were likely to serve their full sentences.
The charges stem from a string of crimes that began early on the morning of Oct. 14, 2019. Around 4 a.m., the three teens approached Ricky Malone Sr., 65, near North Mohawk Avenue and Columbia Boulevard. Malone had been out collecting refundable cans and bottles.
The teens demanded Malone give up his car, a Toyota Avalon. When he refused, Criswelll shot him in the chest with a 12-gauge shotgun, according to accounts given by Criswell and Woodruff to the police and outlined in court documents.
Investigators say before encountering Malone, the teens, one of them wearing a clown mask, had attempted to burglarize a home but ran away when the person who lived there yelled at them.
After shooting Malone, the teens took his car and police began receiving calls that the vehicle had been involved in some hit-and-runs, investigators said. The teens stopped at a Taco Bell about three and a half hours into the joyride, before abandoning the car, according to court documents.
The teens were arrested 11 days later.
During their juvenile hearings, Woodruff admitted to first-degree manslaughter and first-degree robbery. Rand admitted to second-degree manslaughter and first-degree robbery. They will serve their sentences at a juvenile correctional facility, as will Criswell
But under Oregon’s new juvenile sentencing laws, which went into effect last year, all three must be released from custody by their 25th birthdays at the latest, an idea that didn’t sit well with Robert Malone, Ricky Malone Sr.’s brother.
“They could get paroled in a year or two years,” Robert Malone told The Oregonian/OregonLive after Woodruff and Rand were sentenced. “That’s the way the system is now. Our prayers are maybe they’ll get rehabilitated and maybe they’ll come out on the other side better people.”
