A teenager convicted in the 2015 fatal shooting of 14-year-old Lecent Ross at an Etobicoke home has been sentenced to six more months in open custody and just under a year on probation.
Police responded to a shooting call at Jamestown Crescent, in the Kipling Avenue and Albion Road area, at about 10:40 a.m. on July 9, 2015.
Ross was located with a single gunshot wound to the upper body and was pronounced dead in hospital an hour later.
READ MORE: 2 charged in shooting death of 14-year-old Lecent Ross in Etobicoke
A youth, who was 13 years of age at the time of the shooting, pleaded guilty to criminal negligence causing death last fall.
John Erickson, who represents the teen, described what happened as a “traumatic event for everybody” and said his client has expressed remorse for what happened.
“He feels profoundly, profoundly sorry for what happened to her, profoundly sorry for what has happened to her family and the family is sorry for what he’s put his own family through as a result of this,” Erickson told reporters outside of court.
Erickson said his mother expressed concerns about the people the teen was associating with, adding his client “wishes now that he listened to her advice.” The teen moved away from the neighbourhood to try to break ties with some of those people, but it didn’t happen.
“Now with the passage of time he realizes that that is something that he is going to try and steer away from in the future and that he is now doing school work in large measure trying his best to turn things around,” Erickson said.
Alicia Jesquith, Lecent’s mother, said in a victim impact statement submitted to the court that her daughter’s death has had a “huge impact” on her and her family’s life.
“Since Lecent was killed, my whole world has changed. Every day I am filled with sadness, anger, grief, and many other overwhelming emotions. I have lost the ability to be the person I was when she was here,” she wrote.
Jesquith said she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in September, which she said has been “increasingly getting worse” due to the “extreme amount of stress and trauma” she has been through.
She said Lecent’s death has been particularly hard on her siblings.
“After Lecent died, her little brother and sister would lock themselves in their room crying and say that they just want their sister to come back. They ask me if we can do fun stuff like we used to when their sister was still here,” Jesquith wrote.
“This year for Christmas they prayed and asked God if they could have their sister back and for their mom to get better. I am the one left having to explain to them that she cannot come back to us.”
Jesquith said she feels “justice has not been served for Lecent” or the family.
“My family is broken. My daughter is not coming back, and I don’t know where I am supposed to go from here,” she said.
An 18-year-old man was also charged in connection to the incident. The names of both individuals have not been revealed to protect the younger teen’s identity.
Ross was killed when she was struck by a bullet while at a friend’s house in the Jamestown complex area.
READ MORE: ‘I lost her too soon:’ Mother of 14-year-old fatally shot in Toronto speaks out
The shooting death sparked a crime prevention initiative between Toronto Community Housing Corporation (TCHC) and Crime Stoppers.
It saw the addition of the first Crime Stoppers sign on TCHC property and outlined new initiatives in TCHC neighbourhoods such as meetings with residents, youth outreach activities, signs, public awareness and educational materials.
With files from Lama Nicolas
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