A Cook County judge today sentenced a 21-year-old man to 90 years in prison for the 2009 murder of DePaul University honors student Francisco "Frankie" Valencia at a West Side Halloween party.
Narcisco Gatica showed no reaction as Judge Matthew Coghlan announced his decision.
During a lengthy hearing, Valencia's mother, Joy McCormack, took half an hour to read an emotional statement to the court, talking about lying with him at night laughing and planning his future, about his dreams of changing the world.
"Our family is left feeling broken," McCormack said through tears. "On many days it seems like this darkness is stronger than I am."
A jury convicted Gatica last month of first-degree murder and aggravated battery for fatally shooting Valencia and wounding a woman at a party in a rented condominium in Chicago's Humboldt Park neighborhood.
A co-defendant, Berly Valladares, was previously sentenced to 70 years in prison for supplying the gun to Gatica.
Prosecutors said Gatica, an admitted Maniac Latin Disciple gang member, was angry after he and friends were kicked out of the party in the 1700 block of North Rockwell Street. Valencia was shot in the chest, while Daisy Camacho, 23, was wounded in the neck.
In a videotaped interview with Chicago police, Gatica first denied he was at the scene, then tried to blame Valladares and finally confessed that it was him captured on surveillance video firing a TEC-9 pistol four or five times
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