Richmond, Va. – A judge sentenced the convicted killer of a Richmond family to death Monday for his role in a bloody crime spree that left four other people dead.
Circuit Judge Beverly Snukals followed the jury’s recommendation in imposing the ultimate punishment on Ricky Jovan Gray for the random New Year’s Day slayings of musician Bryan Harvey, 49, his wife and their two young daughters.
The four were found in the basement of their burning home. Authorities said they had been bound, beaten with a hammer and stabbed, and their throats had been cut.
“I cannot pretend to understand the loss of your loved ones. … I sincerely apologize,” Gray said in court as Harvey family members blinked back tears. “I beg you to forgive me.”
Gray, 29, was convicted of capital murder in August. Snukals sentenced him to death for the murders of the two children, Stella, 9, and Ruby, 4, and gave him life sentences for the slayings of Bryan Harvey and the family as a whole.
Gray and his nephew, Ray Joseph Dandridge, both of Arlington, killed the Harveys as part of a violent rampage that included the slaying of a second Richmond family less than a week later, authorities said.
Dandridge, also 29, pleaded guilty last month to three counts of capital murder for the Jan. 6 killings of Percyell Tucker, 55; his wife, Mary Baskerville-Tucker, 47; and her daughter, Ashley Baskerville, 21. The men said Ashley Baskerville was an accomplice in the Harvey slayings.
Gray confessed to the Nov. 5 killing of his 35-year-old wife, Treva Terrell Gray, in Washington, Pa., about 20 miles south of Pittsburgh. In his confession, Gray said he beat his wife to death in their bed with a pipe while Dandridge held her down.
