CEDAR RAPIDS – A man who used a machete to murder his parents on the Meskwaki Nation Settlement was sentenced today to life in federal prison without the possibility of parole.
Gordon Lasley, Jr., age 26, from the Meskwaki Nation Settlement, Iowa, received the prison term after a December 17, 2014, jury verdict finding him guilty of two counts of Second Degree Murder.
The evidence at trial showed that, on February 5, 2014, Lasley murdered Gordon Lasley, Sr. and Kim Renee Lasley at their home on the Meskwaki Nation Settlement by striking them each multiple times with a machete. Lasley’s attorneys unsuccessfully argued Lasley was insane at the time of the murders and should not be held criminally responsible for the murders.
Lasley was sentenced in Cedar Rapids by United States District Court Chief Judge Linda R. Reade. Lasley was sentenced to a term of life imprisonment on each count, with the prison terms to run consecutively. A special assessment of $200 was imposed, and he was ordered to make $156.80 in restitution to the Iowa Crime Victim Compensation program. There is no parole in the federal system.
Lasley is being held in the United States Marshal’s custody until he can be transported to a federal prison.
The case was prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorneys CJ Williams and Anthony Morfitt and was investigated by the Meskwaki Nation Tribal Police Department, the Tama County Sheriff’s Office, the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
GUILTY
They should just take him out and shoot him in the head. Cheaper that way.