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By Thomas Tracy
Brooklyn Daily
A man accused of robbing the same Sovereign Bank twice in two weeks was sentenced to 26 years in prison, prosecutors say.
Edward Pride, 49, was convicted on July 17 of two counts of robbery in the first degree. Cops say he walked into a Sovereign Bank branch on Montague Street in Brooklyn Heights on Feb. 11, 2011 and handed the teller a threatening note, then repeated the scam on Feb. 24 — in front of the same bank employee, police said.
Pride was arrested on March 3, 2011, after he tried the same ploy at Sovereign Bank’s Atlantic Avenue branch, prosecutors say.
Child killer Levi Aron sentenced to 40 years in prison
A judge sentenced Brooklyn butcher Levi Aron to 40 years in prison last week — bringing an end to one of the most gruesome murder cases in recent memory.
Aron said little during the Aug. 29 sentencing. When Judge Neil Firetog asked him to comment about the murder of 8-year-old Leiby Kletzky, all the convicted killer did was raise his head from his slumped shoulders and whisper the word, “No.”
Firetog had more luck a month earlier when prosecutors hammered out a plea deal with Aron’s attorney.
Wearing an orange Department of Corrections jumpsuit and a yarmulke, Levi stammered out a brief account on how he grabbed Kletzky off of a Borough Park street last July, then drugged and smothered the child with a towel when he realized that the entire community was looking for the missing boy.
Yet Aron’s confession wasn’t thorough enough for Firetog, who pelted the muttering murder suspect with questions until he outlined every devilish act.
With the 40-years-to-life plea deal completed, the former hardware store clerk won’t be available for parole until he’s 76-years-old, explained District Attorney Charles Hynes, who said Kletzky’s parents agreed to a plea so aspects of their child’s gruesome death wouldn’t be discussed in graphic detail at trial.
Investigators who tracked down and arrested Aron feel that justice has been served.
“He’s pleading guilty to a top count,” a law-enforcement source told our sister publication, the New York Post. “Aron is getting the sentence he would have gotten at trial.”
Aron’s defense agreed to the plea deal, but still contend that their client wasn’t mentally fit to stand trial, even though a psychiatrist’s report showed that Levi wasn’t unbalanced enough to plead insanity.
“He is very remorseful in his own way and unfortunately his mental capacity precludes him from expressing that,” defense lawyer Jennifer McCann told the Daily News.
Reach Deputy Editor Thomas Tracy at ttracy@cnglocal.com or by calling (718) 260-2525.