Erick Haynes sentenced to life in prison for death of Zaria McKeever
BROOKLYN PARK, Minn. — Erick Haynes, who orchestrated the 2022 killing of 23-year-old Zaria McKeever, the mother of his 1-year-old child, was sentenced to life in prison on Friday.
He submitted a guilty plea which was accepted by the judge at the sentencing. He'll have a possibility of parole after 30 years.
Haynes brought a gun to McKeever's Brooklyn Park apartment on Nov. 8, 2022, and ordered two teenage brothers to kill her new boyfriend, as well as McKeever herself if she got in the way. The teens kicked in the apartment door, and while McKeever's new boyfriend jumped out the window, she was shot dead, charging documents state.
Two other adults — 24-year-old Eriana Haynes and 24-year-old Tavion James — pleaded guilty to charges related to helping after the homicide.
The two minors charged in the case, including 17-year-old Foday Kamara, took plea deals outside of court. Kamara is scheduled to be sentenced in May.
One by one Friday, loved ones spoke through tears in court, before the man who orchestrated the murder of a young mother, learned he'll spend the rest of his life in prison.
"On November 8th, 2022, our lives changed forever," McKeever's said stepfather Paul Greer. "Our Zaria was brutally and violently taken away from us."
"Any amount of time is not enough time," said McKeever's mother, Maria Greer.
The man who took Maria Greer's daughter away had this message: "I just want to say sorry to the family of Miss McKeever," said Erick Haynes.
But after court, McKeever's mother said that Haynes owes the family much more than that.
"I thought it was a coward way of doing things. You give me more than 'I'm sorry to the family,' you give me more than those words. You owed us more than those words," said Maria Greer.
The tragic case sparked controversy. The family protested what they saw as lenient plea deals against the teens in the case and, in a rare move, Governor Tim Walz gave the case to Attorney General Keith Ellison.
Now, with this final chapter closed, family hopes real healing can begin, with the focus now on the 1-year-old girl left behind.
"I want her to know that she's loved, she has a whole family surrounded by love," said Paul Greer.
Kamara was originally offered a plea deal by the Hennepin County Attorney's Office, led by Mary Moriarty, that would've spared him prison time. Moriarty said she wanted Kamara and his brother to undergo rehabilitation while focusing on getting Haynes the most prison time possible.
The move outraged McKeever's family, and for the first time in 30 years, Gov. Tim Walz intervened and rerouted the case to the office of Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison without Moriarty's approval.
"The facts are so far outside of what is expected, what community standards are, that anybody who is the victim of a premeditated murder, there cannot be a minimal disposition for the people who did it, and so that's why we're involved," Ellison told WCCO's Esme Murphy in April 2023.
Moriarty called the move "undemocratic" and the Minnesota Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild criticized the governor's move as one "based on political expedience."
