Former NBA player and Georgia Tech standout Javaris Crittenton was released from prison on Friday after serving a 10-year sentence for the 2011 murder of 22-year-old Jullian Jones. But the victim’s mother now claims that the family was unaware that Crittenton had cut a deal to secure an early release.
Crittenton, who was drafted by the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round of the 2007 NBA Draft and went on to play for the Washington Wizards, was arrested alongside his cousin Douglas Gamble in 2011 after gunning down the Georgia mother of four.
He faced several charges including murder, but eventually pleaded guilty to a lesser charge in 2015 and was subsequently sentenced to 23 years in prison.
But just eight years later, Crittenton is a free man.
Former Fulton County district attorney Paul Howard, the uncle of former NBA star Dwight Howard, made another deal with Crittenton in 2016 to reduce his sentence to 10 years if could prove that he learned from his mistakes and be an example for others not to repeat his, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Crittenton and Dwight Howard, according to the report, were former high school teammates.
"That wasn’t fair for the family not to know what Paul Howard was doing," the victim’s mother, June Woods, told the outlet in an interview published Monday. "I would’ve spoken up then. It’s not fair to us. It’s not fair to her children what he did."
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Crittenton, now 35, was resentenced on April 13 to 10 years in prison, which included time served, and 10 years probation, according to WSB-TV. On Friday, he was released from Wilcox State Prison, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported.
"It’s like a slap in the face to us," Woods told the outlet.
"If her children would’ve been out there, he would’ve shot them, too," she added, separately.
Fani Willis, the current Fulton County district attorney, filed a motion to stop the release, but a judge ruled in favor of the deal agreed to by the previous DA.
Prior to his arrest, Crittenton was suspended by the league in 2010 for bringing a gun into the locker room during an altercation with Wizards’ teammate Gilbert Arenas. He pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor gun charge on Jan. 25, 2010 and received probation.
Prosecutors in the homicide case alleged that Crittenton was aiming for someone that had allegedly robbed him, and not Jullian Jones, on the day of the August 2011 shooting.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
