NEW ORLEANS — Despite racking up more than a dozen convictions, triple-murder suspect Terrance Leonard was never sentenced to significant prison time, despite being eligible for decades in prison as a repeat offender.
Leonard’s adult criminal record starts just after he turned 17, with an arrest and conviction for possession of cocaine. Typical for a first-time adult offender, Leonard received probation, court records show.
Within months, Leonard began violating the terms of that probation, failing to get a GED, falling behind on fines and fees and missing appointments with his probation officer.
Despite those violations, Leonard’s probation was not revoked. Instead, a judge terminated his probation as “unsatisfactory” and Leonard suffered no consequences.
Leonard’s rap sheet only grows from there, but records show that he failed to take advantage of opportunities offered by the criminal justice system. Yet the leniency and the breaks continued, allowing Leonard, now 33, to qualify as a career criminal long before he was booked in Wednesday’s triple murder in which he is accused of using a hammer to fatally beat his live-in girlfriend, Kristina Riley, her 10-year-old son Ayden Riley and her 9-year-old niece, De’ryona Encalada.
Here’s what court records show:
-- In 2004, Leonard was booked with second-degree robbery, but he plea bargained to theft. He received six months on probation, which he quickly violated. As a result, he served six months in jail.
-- In 2005, Leonard was booked with possession of marijuana after a deputy pulled him over in a traffic stop and found a joint. This time Leonard received a year of home incarceration along with probation, but failed his probation after a positive drug test, failure to pay fines and fees and failing to meet with his probation officer. For those violations, he served six months in jail.
-- In 2006, Leonard was again booked with possession of marijuana, and again was given probation and home incarceration.
-- In 2009, Leonard led deputies on a high-speed chase topping 100 miles per hour through the Woodmere subdivision, records show. He pleaded guilty to aggravated flight from an officer, a felony. He could have received more than 10 years in prison, but instead he was sentenced to two years in the Blue Walters drug treatment program operated by the State Department of Corrections.
-- In 2013, Leonard was accused of beating a girlfriend, his first crime of violence outside of resisting arrest. He pleaded guilty to that charge, as well as possession of marijuana. He received a six-month suspended sentence and probation. Like so many times before, he failed to take advantage of his opportunity and was revoked, serving six months in jail.
"It's a shame,” Jefferson Parish Sheriff Joe Lopinto said at a press conference Wednesday when asked about Leonard’s criminal history. “We do our job by arresting them. The system has to do its job by keeping them there and by putting them there for a longer period of time. But we don't have that magic ball.”
Leonard is now eligible for the death penalty on each of the three counts of first-degree murder, crimes for which Lopinto said Leonard has confessed.