Teenage killer wanted the victim’s car. He will spend the rest of his life in prison
Alexander “Alex” Cherp’s mother will never see her only child graduate college, pursue his dream of going to law school or get married. She will never have grandchildren.
“I am and I will always be alone thanks to Alan Baily’s selfishness,” Michelle Cherp said in a Bradenton courtroom on Wednesday afternoon, before Baily was sentenced to life in prison for murdering Alex Cherp.
On the night of Feb. 4, 2017, Baily, 20, and Jose Victor “Jay” Hernandez, 21, had planned to steal Cherp’s 2012 Mercedes C63 AMG which he passionately loved and they coveted. Cherp had met them at a Lakewood Ranch park because he wanted to smoke marijuana but instead Hernandez shot Cherp, and then handed the gun to Baily saying, “Finish him off.”
Baily took the gun and Cherp, delivering a fatal wound.
Greed was clearly the motive, Circuit Judge Frederick P. Mercurio concluded, echoing an impact statement from the victim’s mother.
“For this young man to lose his life in exchange for a car, is absolutely ridiculous,” Mercurio told Baily before sentencing him to life in prison.
In August, after deliberating for about 30 minutes, a jury found Baily guilty as charged of first-degree murder and attempted armed robbery. Hernandez had already taken a plea deal in October 2018, pleading guilty to the lesser charges of second-degree murder and attempted armed robbery in exchange for a 43-year prison sentence.
Because Baily was 17 at the time he killed Cherp, he will be eligible to have a hearing in 25 years for his sentencing to be reviewed.
“If this crime had occurred 4 months later, we would not be having this conversation,” Assistant State Attorney Suzanne O’Donnell argued as she presented the factors required for a juvenile to be sentenced to life in prison.
Judge Mercurio later agreed, finding that had the murder occurred just four months later, the manner in which Cherp was shot and left to die outside his car would have arguably made the case eligible for the death penalty.
Mercurio also found based on the evidence presented at trial that although Hernandez had shot Cherp first, a wound that he would probably would have died from, Baily was primarily responsible because there was no way that the victim could have survived the shot he fired.
“When the co-defendant said to ‘finish him off’, that’s exactly what you did and you knew what you were doing and you did that,” Mercurio said.
Michelle Cherp shared many anecdotes about her son during her brief victim impact statement. She talked about her son’s love for cars and trucks. He loved his car so much that he would wash and vacuum it daily, and would not allow anyone to “eat, touch or literally breathe in that car,” she said jokingly.
“I discovered that when I was cross with Alex, if I left a lotioned hand-print on his car, he would know that he had some explaining to do,” she said. “If I was particularly cross with him, I would find the ugliest lipstick I could find and leave a lovely lip print on the driver’s side print window. I knew that would get his attention.”
Since his death, Michelle Cherp said she has suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and high-blood pressure.
“I constantly wake up with nightmares of two men standing over me with a gun to my head,” she explained. “I can’t see their faces, but I know who they are.”
Just three months before Cherp was killed, Baily had been charged with a similar attempted armed robbery. But the charges were dropped by the state attorney’s office and Baily was released from custody.
“Had the charges not been dropped, my son would still be alive,” Michelle Cherp said during Wednesday’s sentencing hearing.
Judge Mercurio said the similarity between the two cases is what he found most concerning as he prepared for the sentencing hearing. The case was dropped because the victims refused to cooperate because they feared retaliation and that Baily had gang affiliations, according to Mercurio.
Everything Judge Mercurio said before sentencing Baily, validated Michelle Cherp’s feelings about how her son died because greed, she said afterward outside the courthouse.
“It was a breath of fresh air to have that validation of something I had been feeling and frustrated about,” Cherp said. “No one was believing it had to do with a car. But the police were saying it had to.”
