A 24-year-old man who shot four people at a Sacramento park in 2020, killing a 9-year-old girl, has been sentenced to nearly 140 years in prison after his conviction for murder and other charges.
A Sacramento Superior Court jury in March convicted Laise Burton Hands of murdering Makaylah Brent at Mama Marks Park in the city’s Del Paso Heights neighborhood on Oct. 3, 2020.
Hands was attempting to shoot and kill a rival gang member at the park, prosecutors demonstrated; he exited his vehicle and fired nine shots at the park using a 9mm handgun. He instead shot four people, including 9-year-old Makaylah and a 7-year-old girl. Two of the three surviving victims were Makaylah’s relatives.
Hands was found guilty of murder, attempted murder, being a felon in possession of a firearm and two counts of assault with a semiautomatic weapon.
Judge Maryanne Gilliard on Friday sentenced Hands to 138 years, 8 months to life in prison. The court found true an allegation of a prior-strike conviction against Hands for assault with a semiautomatic firearm.
A second shooter in the incident, a male suspect who remained seated in the vehicle behind Hands, fired two additional shots using a .40-caliber handgun, according to the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office.
That suspect has not yet been identified, according to prosecutors and law enforcement, who have not specified the shooters’ gang affiliations.