- Rogel Aguilera Mederos was sentenced to 110 years in prison this month for a truck
crash that killed four people. - District attorney Alexis King asked a
judge to lower Mederos'sentence to 20-to-30 years on Monday.
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Rogel Aguilera Mederos, a 26-year-old truck driver, was sentenced to 110 years in prison earlier this month after he was convicted in a 2019 crash that killed four. Mederos has claimed his brakes failed before the deadly pile-up.
Colorado judge A. Bruce Jones said he was forced to have Mederos's sentences run concurrently due to state law after a jury convicted him on 27 counts on December 13.
Jefferson County District Attorney Alexis King had asked Jones for a hearing to consider lowering Mederos' sentence on December 22. At a scheduling hearing on Monday, King asked Jones to consider lowering Mederos' sentence to 20-t0-30 years.
Jones cut King off before she could explain why she wanted Jones to lower the sentence and reminded her that the hearing was meant for scheduling Mederos' resentencing date.
"This is a scheduling hearing," Jones said in court. "That sort of stuff that is exactly the sort of stuff you ought to be saying with the defendant present, not in his absence."
Jones set Medero's resentencing hearing for January 13.
King's request to lower the sentence came after deputy district attorney Kayla Wildeman, who was a part of Mederos' prosecution, posted a photo of a brake shoe she received as a gift on social media.
King issued a statement that said Wildeman's post was "in poor taste" and the brake shoe was "not a piece of evidence from this case."
Over 4.9 million people signed a petition asking Colorado Gov. Jared Polis to grant clemency to Mederos. Kim Kardashian also urged Polis to commute Aguilera-Mederos' sentence and reform Colorado sentencing laws on Twitter.
"I pray that Governor Polis, who has been a leader on supporting reforms that increase human dignity in the legal system, will commute his sentence," Kardashian wrote on Twitter.