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Chrystul Kizer, a Milwaukee woman who was charged for killing her suspected sex trafficker, was sentenced to 11 years in prison on Monday.
Kizer, now 24, was sentenced by Kenosha County Judge David P. Wilk in connection with the 2018 death of 34-year-old Randall Volar. In addition to the 11 years of initial confinement, Kizer was also sentenced to five years of extended supervision.
However, the court credited Kizer with 570 days or about one and a half years of time already served, reducing her total time behind bars, the Associated Press (AP) reported.
Kizer, who was 17 at the time of the incident, had initially faced multiple charges, including first-degree intentional homicide, arson and car theft as prosecutors said she shot Volar at his Kenosha, Wisconsin, home in 2018 before burning down his house and stealing his BMW.
However, Kizer said she met Volar on a sex trafficking website and alleged that he had been sexually abusing her and selling her as a prostitute for over a year.
In interviews and court filings, Kizer has said that in exchange for sex acts, Volar took her on dates and groomed her with cash and shopping trips.
On the night of June 4, 2018, Kizer said she shot Volar at his home after he attempted to assault her.
In May of this year, Kizer pleaded guilty to second-degree reckless homicide with use of a dangerous weapon, which carried a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison. The plea deal allowed her to avoid trial and the possibility of a life sentence.
Newsweek reached out to the National Human Trafficking Hotline and the Kenosha prosecutor’s office via email on Monday for comment.
Kizer’s case has garnered widespread attention, and her defense team argued that her actions were protected under a 2008 Wisconsin law that exempts sex trafficking victims from criminal liability for offenses committed as a direct result of their exploitation. Similar laws have been enacted in more than 30 states over the past decade that allow trafficking victims to be acquitted of certain charges against them if they can prove at trial that a crime was committed because of their abuse.
Prosecutors, however, maintained that the law was never intended to cover homicide cases.
Despite this, the state Supreme Court ruled in 2022 that Kizer could use the trafficking defense at trial, a decision that drew support from anti-violence groups who argued that trafficking victims often feel forced to defend themselves by any means necessary, the AP reported.
Despite her defense, though, Judge Wilk reportedly acknowledged that while sex trafficking is a serious concern, he questioned Kizer’s statements expressing remorse.
“It appears that your relationship with the truth seems fluid and opportunistic,” Wilk said, according to The Washington Post.