Background: Kevon Lawless speaks to his attorney in Jefferson Circuit Court in Kentucky (WLKY/YouTube). Inset: Trinity Randolph (A.D. Porter & Sons Funeral Home).
A man in Kentucky will spend decades behind bars for fatally shooting a 3-year-old girl playing in a dollhouse along with her father due to a conflict between the men.
Kevon Lawless, 29, was sentenced on Thursday to 35 years in prison after pleading guilty to murder in the deaths of 21-year-old Brandon Waddles and his 3-year-old daughter, Trinity Randolph, area ABC affiliate WHAS reported. He had previously been sentenced to life without parole in 2022 after being found guilty of two counts of murder, but the Kentucky Supreme Court overturned that conviction in 2024 after finding that a mistrial should have been granted once a judge had a witness arrested for perjury and the news of that arrest spread among the jurors.
"This defendant was first found responsible by a jury for the senseless killing of a father and his three-year-old daughter, and now, has fully admitted to his responsibility," Jefferson County Commonwealth's Attorney Gerina Whethers said after Thursday's sentencing. "At last, after six years since their deaths, we have justice for Brandon Waddles and Trinity Randolph."
On Aug. 13, 2020, Lawless, another man named Evan Ross, and a woman "hatched a plan to set up and murder Waddles," according to prosecutors' account of events recalled by the state's high court. This plan was "the culmination of a preexisting dispute" between Lawless and Waddles, and Lawless had "enlisted his girlfriend" to reach out to Waddles "and feign interest in starting a relationship." The following day, the woman said, she was on her way to see Waddles as Ross drove Lawless to Waddles' home on Kahlert Avenue in Louisville, Kentucky.
When the woman asked Waddles to come outside, Lawless jumped out of Ross' Chrysler 200 and fired 11 shots at Waddles. Ross then drove Lawless away, according to prosecutors.
The Louisville Metro Police Department responded to the home and found a "mess." Waddles was on the floor "lying in a hallway in a pool of blood." He had been shot six times, and he was pronounced dead.
Trinity, the child, had been playing in her dollhouse, fashioned after the movie "Frozen," when she was shot, regional CBS affiliate WYMT reported. She had been shot in the back of the neck, and despite officers' attempts to save her, she was pronounced dead.
According to prosecutors, Lawless attempted to cover his tracks in the aftermath of the shooting. "[W]e gotta lay low," he texted his girlfriend less than two hours afterward.
The next day, he wrote, "your courage better be strong." When police showed up at Ross' home, the two men apparently exchanged multiple phone calls, and Lawless texted his girlfriend, "DID YOU TELL!!!!!!!" and "YOU AINT RIGHT!"
Ross was arrested. He was later sentenced in 2022 to 10 years in prison, according to Louisville CBS affiliate WLKY. He had pleaded guilty to facilitating the murders and burglary in exchange for a five-year probated sentence, and as part of the deal with prosecutors, agreed to testify about what Lawless did. During that testimony, however, he claimed that he didn't hear any gunshots — testimony that a judge later called "a ridiculous lie" that prompted audible laughter from jurors.
That testimony ultimately led to a perjury charge against Ross, and landed Lawless' case before the Kentucky Supreme Court.
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