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Man again sentenced to life, no parole for 1996 decapitation

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Federico Luis Cruz testifies before Judge Dennis Leiber at the Kent County Courthouse on Monday, Nov. 5, 2018. Cruz , serving life in prison without parole for killing and decapitating a teen in 1996 and mutilating the head in front of a video camera is getting a chance at a new sentence. (Neil Blake/The Grand Rapids Press via AP)

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. – A western Michigan man has again been sentenced to life in prison without parole for killing and decapitating a teen in 1996 and mutilating the head in front of a video camera.

WOOD-TV reports that 39-year-old Federico Cruz learned his fate Wednesday in a Kent County courtroom.

Cruz was 16 when 17-year-old David Crawford was suffocated. Crawford’s head was cut off and later mutilated.

Cruz was convicted of murder and got the mandatory sentence after a jury rejected an insanity defence. Cruz and many Michigan juvenile lifers who are serving no-parole sentences are eligible for a new hearing because of a U.S. Supreme Court decision.

The television station reports that a judge told Cruz Wednesday that progress made in prison toward rehabilitation does not mitigate that he is a sociopath.

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