A Fairfax County family feels let down by the criminal justice system after the trial of a man convicted of killing his stepdaughter's boyfriend.
Terrence Butler was found guilty of voluntary manslaughter for killing 23-year-old Raphael Pierce in the Hybla Valley area in August 2021.
County prosecutors asked a jury to find Butler guilty of murder, with a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison. Instead, they convicted him on a lesser charge this week and recommended a sentence of just three years.
The victim’s mother, Diana Whitley, said she was disappointed by the verdict and recommended sentence.
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"I'm broken. My heart is shattered. It's beyond repair,” she said in an exclusive interview with News4.
A family barbecue became a crime scene when Butler, then 40, shot and killed Pierce, his stepdaughter’s boyfriend, after an argument. Pierce and his girlfriend, Tianna Mack, have a son, Sai, who was just 3 at the time.
When Tianna Mack heard the gunshot at the party, she ran to see what had happened, holding her son in her arms.
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“He was asking, ‘Why is Daddy bleeding? Why is Daddy on the floor bleeding?’” she said.
In addition to the voluntary manslaughter charge, Butler faces a charge of possession of a weapon by a felon, related to the gun he used to kill Pierce. That charge hasn't gone to trial but if he’s convicted of it, he will get a mandatory five-year prison sentence.
A judge will ultimately decide Butler's sentence for the voluntary manslaughter conviction. If the judge takes the jury's recommendation of a three-year sentence for voluntary manslaughter and Butler also is found guilty of the weapon charge, he would be sentenced to more time for having the gun than for using it to kill Pierce.
In the meantime, a little boy regularly asks his mother a question.
“He’s been asking, ‘When is Daddy gonna come back from heaven?' and that just really breaks my heart,” Tianna Mack said.
With the trial behind them, Pierce’s relatives said they hope the judge considers a harsher sentence than the jury recommended.
Butler is due in court in early June and could be sentenced then.
