LOS ANGELES — A cop killer has been sentenced to life in prison on Monday for the execution-style murder of a Los Angeles Sheriff’s sergeant in 2016. The parolee previously pleaded guilty to the homicide, according to reports.
Trenton Trevon Lovell, 31, was sentenced for killing Sgt. Steve Owen, who was shot five times on Oct. 5, 2016, as he answered a 911 report of a burglary in progress at an apartment building in Lancaster, KTLA reported.
Prior to his death, the sergeant radioed that he had the burglary suspect at gunpoint. He was standing outside his patrol car when Lovell shot him in the head. Yet that wasn’t good enough. He then fired four more times into his face and chest as Owen lay wounded on the ground, according to prosecutors.
The parolee had a criminal record of nearly a dozen previous arrests and two previous convictions for robbery at the time of Owen’s murder. Lovell reportedly confessed to investigators that after wounding the sergeant he “finished the job” by emptying his gun into Owen.
During victim impact statements, Owen’s daughter, Shannon Owen, said she was walking to her car after finishing classes at a college when she heard gunshots from the neighborhood across the street.
“I heard you killing my dad,” she told Lovell at the sentencing hearing, KTLA reported.
Owens widow also had a message for her husband’s killer.
“My heart breaks for my children,” said, Tania Owen. “And you know what? My heart breaks for your mother, for your sister and your niece. They are lovely ladies. Both families are losing a loved one.”
Lovell pleaded guilty in April to several crimes committed on the day Owen was killed, including first-degree murder, attempted murder, burglary, robbery and false imprisonment by violence.
Following the murder, Lovell jumped into Owen’s patrol vehicle. When a second deputy arrived at the scene, Lovell rammed into that patrol vehicle with Owen’s patrol vehicle, prosecutors said. Lovell then fled and ran into a nearby residence where he held two victims at knifepoint and robbed them. He was arrested about 90 minutes later, CBS Los Angeles reported.
Progressive District Attorney George Gascón opposes the death penalty, therefore it was not sought by prosecutor’s in the case.
