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The death penalty was not carried out in the Craig Lang case: Feds


The US Department of Justice will waive the death penalty in case of Craig Lang, an Army veteran who fought with a far-right paramilitary unit in Ukraine and who is accused by authorities of killing a couple in southwestern Florida in April 2018.

The case is being closely watched by US officials and experts studying far-right extremism, who are increasingly concerned about Americans traveling to Ukraine to train with far-right and active militant groups. gain combat experience.

During a status hearing held via Zoom in Fort Myers on Monday, Jesus Casas, assistant US attorney for Florida’s Central District, told the court the government had decided to waive the death penalty. in the hope of speeding up Lang’s extradition from Kyiv, where he currently resides under limited house arrest.

Ukraine is very sensitive to the issue of the death penalty, which was abolished in 2000. Lang and his lawyers participated in the European Court of Human Rights, which ordered Lang’s extradition to be held until further notice. may reconsider his case. An ECHR spokesperson did not say when the review would be completed.

Casas said during Monday’s hearing that the US government would still seek the death penalty for Lang’s accomplice, Alex Zwiefelhofer, an Army veteran who also fought alongside far-right extremists. in eastern Ukraine and who has been detained by the US since 2019.

Lang, 30, and Zwiefelhofer, 23, allegedly used fake identities to lure Serafin “Danny” Lorenzo and Deana Lorenzo to a nightly meeting at a business complex in the town of Estero, where the couple hoped would buy guns from men and resell them for a profit. Instead, Lang and Zwiefelhofer allegedly shot Lorenzos down in a dramatic duel attack, let them die, and stole $3,000.

After killing the couple, the former soldiers planned to use the money to flee by yacht to South America, where they wanted to “take part in an armed conflict against the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela” and killing “communists”, the authorities allege. However, the getaway didn’t go as planned and Zwiefelhofer was later arrested in his home state of Wisconsin and moved to Florida, where he awaits trial in December. Lang managed to return. back to Ukraine, but he was eventually detained by the Ukrainian authorities in August 2019, after returning from a short trip to Moldova. Border forces stopped him after seeing that an Interpol warrant had been issued for his arrest.

In a text message, Lang’s main lawyer in Ukraine, Dmytro Morhun, declined to comment on Monday’s developments.

A relative of Lorenzos told BuzzFeed News on Monday that they are pleased with the development. In April, the relative, who asked not to be named out of concern for their safety, said they did not want the death penalty for Lang; They just want him back to Florida to face trial. “We just want him to pay,” the relative said.

Bjorn Brunvand, an attorney appointed by a US court for Lang, told Judge Sheri Polster Chappell that he had “asked” about the possibility of Lang’s extradition but said he still did not know when, if ever, Lang will be detained by the US.

With uncertainty surrounding Lang’s condition, Casas told Judge Chappell that the government was pursuing Zwiefelhofer’s case in a different direction.

Government lawyers, Lang and Zwiefelhofer, agree that the pandemic has slowed their progress in gathering what is needed to prepare for the trial. Zwiefelhofer’s attorney, D. Todd Doss, said he needed more travel time to meet witnesses and gather documents to defend his client.

Lang and Zwiefelhofer first met in Ukraine, where they joined the far-right group Right Sector in 2016. Infamous for it neo-Nazi membership and alleged human rights abuses, it evolved from a coalition of right-wing militant groups formed during Ukraine’s Euromaidan uprising in 2014. The Right Sector later restructured itself into a volunteer fighting battalion following Russia’s annexation Crimea and sparked a war in the Donbas region, eastern Ukraine.

Other Americans who fought in Ukraine told BuzzFeed News in interviews that Lang and Zwiefelhofer became increasingly radical in their views and extremely correct behavior during their time in the country.

The two men left Ukraine in 2017 after hostilities subsided and then tried their luck when joining forces in South Sudan. They never made it through and were instead detained and deported back to the US, where authorities allege they would eventually regroup and plan attacks on Lorenzos to further fund the raids. overseas combat adventure.

Since then, Lang has been in a detention center or under house arrest in Ukraine. He currently lives in Kyiv with his fiance and their toddler and has to wear an ankle monitor. He said in a hearing attended by BuzzFeed News in February that he teaches online English lessons to Ukrainians to support his family.

At the same trial, Lang testified that the US government also wanted to prosecute him for war crimes charges committed on the battlefields of Ukraine.

“Any Russian separatist or soldier that I have killed will be charged with murder,” he told a Ukrainian court. “Please understand that any soldier I capture will be charged with kidnapping.”



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