DATE: OCTOBER 4, 2019
FROM: HOLLEY CARNRIGHT
RE: PRESS RELEASE – MAURICE STANSBERRY SR.
MAURICE STANSBERRY SR. SENTENCED
Following his conviction on July 26 by an Ulster County trial jury of 8 men and 4 women, 39-year-old Maurice Stansberry, Sr., of 27 Washington Avenue in Kingston, was sentenced on Friday for the murder of Mark Lancaster.
Stansberry, Sr., shot and killed Mr. Lancaster on Sawkill Road close to noon time on December 1, 2018, after a gunpoint robbery of marijuana from Lancaster’s teenage son at Sawkill Trailer Park.
The parents of Mark Lancaster, Donna and Carmelo Quiles, spoke to the court about their grievous loss and the continuing impact and trauma the murder has had on their family. The victim’s mother recounted that “every time an ambulance goes by, I get triggered” - it reminds her of the ambulance being on the way to save her son but never getting there before her son died. The victim’s family also spoke of their pain, especially of the victim’s 17-year-old son living with the memory of his father saying, “help me, they shot me” as his life slipped away. The victim’s father called the defendant a coward. They asked for the maximum sentence.
Our office supported the victim’s family’s request for the maximum sentence allowed by law. At sentencing Sr. ADA Emmanuel Nneji pointed to a tattoo of a stack of $100 bills and a pistol on the defendant’s left shoulder as symbolic, and pointed out that Stansberry fled to an apartment in Stony Run where he smoked the stolen marijuana while the victim laid dying on Sawkill Road. Mr. Nneji pointed out that the defendant’s crime will forever have a profound impact on all the victim’s family, especially during birthdays, holidays and other memorable occasions for the victim’s family; and it will also impact the lives of the defendant’s own 5 children ages 3 – 21. The prosecutor asked the court to consider all information known to the court about the defendant from the trial and pretrial proceedings and impose the maximum sentence.
Stansberry Sr. was represented by Russell Schindler of the Public Defender’s Office who recounted difficulties in his client’s life and upbringing; he asked the court to impose less than the maximum sentences. The defendant declined to say anything in his own behalf.
Ulster County Court Judge Donald Williams called the defendant’s life one of violence and gangs, contempt for the law, and wanton disregard for others, as demonstrated by his present crime and criminal history for 23 years. The court sentenced Stansberry Sr. to 25 years to life in prison for murder, 25 years for each of the three first degree robbery convictions, 25 years for first degree criminal use of a firearm, and 15 years each for second degree criminal possession of a weapon and second degree robbery, all sentences to run concurrently.
The case was prosecuted by Sr. Assistant District Attorney Emmanuel Nneji and Assistant District Attorney Timothy Lawson. The defendant was represented by Russell Schindler of the Ulster County Public Defender’s Office.