At a sentencing hearing in Franklin County Common Pleas Court, attorneys for two men convicted of double murder blamed the other defendant for the deadly 2022 robbery.
But Judge Stephen McIntosh said it didn’t matter which codefendant did the shooting because evidence shows both men planned the armed robbery.
McIntosh sentenced both Mason Thompson Bray, 24, of Grove City, and Skylor Vanhouten, 22, of Prairie Township, on Wednesday to life in prison with the opportunity for parole after 56 years.
Justifying the lengthy prison terms, McIntosh said this case is one of the worst he’s seen.
A jury in Franklin County Common Pleas Court in November convicted Thompson Bray and Vanhouten in the deaths of 19-year-old Trintan Mendoza and 21-year-old Francisco Rodriguez.
The victims were shot 14 times between them — many times at close range — on May 27, 2022, inside their Prairie Township home. Both perpetrators were armed, but the bullets came from one gun based on ballistic evidence, according to Franklin County Assistant Prosecutor Jason Manning.