PHOENIX -- A Glendale man was sentenced to more than 25 years in prison after pleading guilty to killing a man who had stopped to help break up an argument on a Peoria street almost three years ago
Thirty-year-old Andrew Robins was sentenced to 28 years in prison in Phoenix courtroom on Friday.
"Your husband was senselessly and needlessly taken for absolutely no reason," Robins said at his sentencing.
Standing and facing the family of Roger Staats, Andrew Robins asked for forgiveness.
"I hope that one day somehow you can heal and find forgiveness towards me," said Robins.
In January, 2007 Staats was riding his bike in Glendale when he stopped and tried to intercede in a roadside argument between Robins and Robins' girlfriend.
Investigators say Staats pedaled toward the parked car and asked Robins' girlfriend if she needed any help. They say Robins pushed Staats from his bicycle, then hit and stomped on him repeatedly around the head.
Staats was taken to a Phoenix hospital, where he later died. Robins fled and broke into a construction yard where he tried to steal a forklift before being arrested by Glendale police.
"Mr. Staats was the kindest, gentlest person you could ever want to meet," said Wanda Staats, Roger's widow.
The slaying occurred about five weeks after the victim's 30-year-old son -- Army Staff Sgt. David Staats -- was killed in a roadside bomb attack in Baghdad.
"They're together and they're happy," Wanda said.
The family says they played a part in Robin's plea deal. They didn't want to suffer through a trial.
"He gets to go sit in his cell and from minute to minute, hour by hour, has to hear those screams from that man that wanted him to stop," Wanda said.
They have a sense of closure.
"I hope he rots," said Wanda.
But not a sense of forgiveness.
"Forgiveness is going to take a very long time," said Bethany Staats, Roger's daughter.
At least not yet.
