Belen Mulugeta looked across the courtroom at the man who shot her brother to death two years ago, put her hands to her face and began shaking her head violently.
It was minutes before she could speak Monday afternoon at the sentencing of 48-year-old Dale Baylis, who received 30 years for second-degree murder as part of a plea bargain.
She recalled how she and her brother Natnael Mulugeta, a 27-year-old 7-Eleven clerk, first flew to America together excited about the new opportunities before them. The last time the siblings flew together, his remains traveled home to Ethiopia in cargo.
“He had so many dreams, so many wishes. All that shattered in the middle of the night,” Belen Mulugeta said. “We’re still here, living with a hole in our hearts. Nothing can ever repair that. Nothing.”
After Baylis perceived a slight from Mulugeta in the course of a late-night 7-Eleven run, Baylis returned to the store around 3:30 a.m. May 2, 2009 to shoot his fleeing victim.
“I’ve been shot in the back for no reason,” a dying Mulugeta told a 9-1-1 operator, according to the prosecutor.
Baylis’ family pointed to his troubled past: a learning disability, a rape he sustained as a child, a schizoaffective disorder diagnosed later in life.
His mother apologized to Mulugeta’s friends and family for keeping a high-velocity hunting rifle in the home she shared with her son.
His friends and family repeatedly characterized Baylis as a gentle and good person when he’s on his medication.
In his decision to give Baylis the maximum sentence allowed under the plea agreement, Judge Martin Egelhoff pointed to a 2003 incident where Baylis was arrested in the beating and stabbing of a 66-year-old woman in Arapahoe County. He was sent to a state mental facility for 2-1/2 years.
“What greater threat can there be to the community than someone like you, who by all accounts on medication is a good human being,” Egelhoff asked. “But when you’re off medication, you stab somebody or you shoot them and kill them.”
Jessica Fender: 303-954-1244 or jfender@denverpost.com.
