Two men charged in a 2010 Lexington murder changed their plea form not guilty to guilty after their chargers were reduced.
Emotions ran high for the family of Ricardo Cole in the courtroom Monday, who have waited four years for justice and the final outcome wasn’t what they wanted.
“It’s wrong. Its justice so they say but it’s wrong,” Cole’s mother Elanda Warran said.
Kenneth Wadkins and Joseph Richardson were charged in Cole’s murder.
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Cole was shot to death in the Camelot West parking lot in December 2010.
The Commonwealth agreed to reduce the charges against the men in court because some of the key witnesses in the case wouldn’t agree to testify.
Wadkins charges were reduced to criminal facilitation to manslaughter and Richardson to reckless homicide.
Both pled guilty to those charges with a recommended sentence of five years.
“I feel like he has been killed all over again if they weren’t going to do anything they should have let it go in the beginning instead of letting us go through all of this,” Warran said.
Richardson admitted to shooting Cole that night. He said he then got in a vehicle with Wadkins.
Even though that confession was made in the courtroom, the Commonwealth said there was nothing they could do.
“If we were to go to trail we can’t use anything they say in a guilty plea,” Assistant Commonwealth Attorney Kimberly Baird said.
Sentencing for both men is set for April 30.
