Man Sentenced To 48 Years In Prison In Derby Murder Case: Feds

DERBY, CT — An Ansonia man accused of murdering another man in Derby in 2017 was sentenced Monday to nearly 50 years in prison, according to court officials.

In a news release, Ansonia/Milford Judicial District State's Attorney Margaret Kelley said a judege sentenced Jacob "Jewla" Freeman, 28, of Ansonia, to 48 years in prison and five years of special parole.

According to Kelley, a superior court jury found Freeman guilty of murder on June 25. The conviction stems from the shooting death of Jajuan Benavides, 21, on Anson Street in Derby.

Evidence at trial indicated on Aug. 11, 2017, around 1:48 a.m., a person wearing all black and a mask chased Benavides down Anson Street and shot him three times, according to Kelley.

Surveillance footage and call detail records determined Freeman was in the area of Anson and 6th streets around 11:30 p.m. on Aug. 10, 2017, and interacted with Benavides, Kelley said.

Freeman could subsequently be seen leaving the area around 11:55 p.m.

About a year and a half after the fatal shooting, a jailhouse witness provided numerous details regarding the murder, including that Freeman told him that he returned to the Anson Street area masked up, pulled his gun out on Benavides and shot at him, Kelley said.

The witness told investigators Freeman told him he shot Benavides, "stood over him and let him have it" and watched as he fell to the ground, according to Kelley.

Freeman told the witness Benavides was saying "chill Jewla chill." The witness said Freeman was wearing black pants, a black hoodie and a mask at the time of the crime, according to Kelley.

Though the witness refused to testify at trial, his prior testimony at an earlier probable cause hearing about the murder of Benavides was admitted at this trial, Kelley said.

Twelve witnesses in total, including three witnesses to the crime, testified for the state and indicated what they saw that night. A resident of the area also testified what she heard the night of the murder, according to Kelley.

The state also successfully admitted into evidence a rap video Freeman made and posted on social media just one month after the homicide in which he is heard making specific admissions about how the shooting occurred in his lyrics, Kelley said.

The jury reached its verdict after less than a day of deliberations.

At Monday's sentencing hearing, Senior Assistant State's Attorney Marc Durso asked the judge for a prison sentence that would send a message to others that gun violence will be punished severely, and noted that a sentencing report prepared by probation officials described Freeman as a high risk to offend again, according to Kelley.

Durso described the incident as "an assassination" and noted how Freeman "hunted down" Benavides after lying in wait for him and fired multiple shots as Benavides tried to run away, according to Kelley.

"No amount of time is enough to bring Jajuan back," Durso said in a news release, "but this is a life sentence his family has to live with, and I think the penalty should reflect the equivalent for Mr. Freeman."

Judge Eliot Prescott called the murder a "planned attack," according to Kelley.

"This didn't happen in the blink of an eye," Prescott said in a news release. "This was planned. You left the Anson Street area, you went somewhere else, you came back and you executed him. That's calculated. That's cold."