A dad will spend the rest of his life in prison for the heinous murder of a Lafayette mother and her daughter.
Devonta Roberts, 28, was sentenced to 120 years in prison by Judge Sean Persin on Friday. In May, Roberts entered a plea of guilty to two counts of murder: one for the murder of his 22-year-old girlfriend, Victoria Moore, and another for the murder of their 3-year-old daughter, Datoria Roberts, according to WFLI.
Roberts began firing at Moore on July 5, 2021, while she was holding their child in her arms on the inside of a Romney Meadows residence. He gunned down the pair 22 times with a handgun and an extended magazine that he was openly carrying around the apartments.
Moore’s nonverbal 5-year-old son begged neighbors for assistance, prompting police to respond. Persin described the body-cam footage from the scene as the “worst video” he’d ever seen.
While fighting for her life, the 3-year-old girl informed a Lafayette policeman, “My daddy killed me.” She was airlifted to a hospital in Indianapolis, where she died from loss of blood.
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And in the meantime, officers discovered her mother dead on the kitchen floor.
Roberts has bipolar disorder and receives Social Security benefits because of a learning disability. His defense attorneys pointed out that his IQ is lesser than that of 99% of Americans.
They declined to comment following the hearing, only stating that Roberts intended to appeal his sentence.
When given an opportunity to speak, Roberts began to look around the courthouse at relatives and said, “I wish I could give them back to you.”
He gazed blankly as he heard his sentence, whereas victims’ families wiped away tears and shook in suffering.
