THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, September 29, 1994 TAG: 9409290483
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ANGELITA PLEMMER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHESAPEAKE LENGTH: Medium: 68 lines
A 23-year-old man who robbed and beat to death a disabled Vietnamese immigrant whom he had befriended was sentenced Wednesday to life in prison plus 10 years
The defendant, Alexander Matthews, wept and begged for mercy during the sentencing in Circuit Court. He pleaded guilty in July to murdering 53-year-old Ai N. Tran in May last year.
``I made a mistake,'' Matthews told Judge Robert S. Wahab. ``I don't feel my life should be thrown away for one mistake. There isn't a day that doesn't go by when I don't think about it and I wish I could have done it differently.''
He received the maximum penalty under law.
Tran, who lived in the Georgetown Colony neighborhood, emigrated to this country in 1975 from Saigon, Vietnam. A slight man with a slow gait, he walked with the help of a cane after a job accident left him permanently disabled, relatives said.
Tran often hired neighborhood youths for $4.50 an hour to cut his grass, paint, repair cracked cement around his pool or perform other odd jobs. Family members said Tran was repairing his home for an upcoming engagement party for one of his daughters.
``I was his right-hand man,'' Matthews testified. ``Anything Mr. Ai wanted done, it was done.''
But their three-month relationship ended after Matthews went to Tran's home to rob him late one evening, said Commonwealth's Attorney David Williams.
During the hearing, Williams asked Matthews to recount how he beat Tran and stole the immigrant's black Volkswagen Quantum, television, VCR and other items.
Matthews also testified that he and two girlfriends later went out to eat at a local waffle house - his treat - and then went on a $600 to $700 shopping spree in Norfolk, buying clothing, jewelry and other items.
He was arrested a week after the murder, after leading police on a car chase from Norfolk to Chesapeake. The chase ended when Matthews crashed Tran's car on Providence Road.
``There are no words that I have that can convey to you how horrible this crime is,'' Williams told the judge. ``And without even one iota of remorse or sense of wrongdoing, he went out and spent money wildly.''
Tran, who was beaten nearly beyond recognition and sustained 14 cracked ribs, was found by his daughter and son-in law in the master bedroom of his home, stuffed between the mattress and headboard of his bed.
Matthews, however, said he only hit Tran three times in the head after the immigrant allegedly began making sexual advances.
``Mr. Ai was alive when I left the house and I know I didn't kill him. I didn't mean to hurt him,'' Matthews said in a tremulous voice.
But Wahab, after viewing police photos of the murder scene, called the crime a ``brutal, bestial beating.''
Citing Matthews' failure to accept responsibility for his actions, Wahab said Matthews' ``conduct indicates a very callous disregard for the victim in this case . . . and the attitude that is almost consistent with a depraved mind.''
After the hearing, Tran's family and Matthews' family comforted each other in the corridor outside the courtroom. ``We have sympathy with what they've been through,'' said Michael Le, Tran's son-in-law. ``They are as much the victims as we are.''
Matthews will be eligible for parole in 12 years.
KEYWORDS: MURDER BEATING TRIAL SENTENCING by CNB