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The sound of Debra Wright's pain penetrated through the courtroom window glass and into the soul. Deputies had to help her off the stand after reading her victim impact statement. It is the pain of a mother who has lost a child to violence, of a mother who saw no pain in the eyes of the killer.
"He didn't look at me. I didn't see nothing. No pain. No remorse. I'm sorry but I'm just keeping it as I feel," she told reporters outside the courtroom after she had a chance to compose herself.
It's a pain she has already carried for one year and one day.
Last April, Albee Lewis confronted Ashanti Hunter as she got into her cousin's car in north Harris County. He pumped five shots into her as her three children watched in horror. One of her children was Lewis' daughter. It wasn't their first violent encounter.
"In preparing the case, the state learned that Ashanti endured a great deal of domestic abuse in the last three years prior to her death," said Corvana Cloud with the Harris County District Attorney's Office.
Yet, he was still free and still able to kill her. Cloud says the case has forced the DA's office, the Harris County Sheriff's Office and advocacy groups to review how they respond to domestic violence victims. Ashanti's mother says she doesn't hate Lewis, but doesn't forgive him either. While he'll do 50 years, she got a life sentence to pain.
"I feel a little bitty weight removed from my shoulders. Because I had took him in as my son," Wright said.
Because he pleaded guilty, he will get no channels to appeal.