By Heather Harlan
A Queens teenager was sentenced to 17 years in prison for helping to rob and murder a Chinese food deliveryman last year.
James Stone, 17, pleaded guilty in August to participating in the crime, which he allegedly carried out with four friends in a plot to get some free food.
Prosecutors say the five lured deliveryman Jin-Sheng Liu, 44, to an abandoned house in Queens on Sept. 1, 2000, intending to grab the food and run. Stone admitted that when Liu arrived just before midnight, he threw a sheet over the victim’s head. Another teen, Robert Savage, 15, is accused of then bashing Liu in the head with a brick. While Liu lay dying in a pool of blood, the five returned to the house of one of the suspects, where they feasted on their order of General Tso’s chicken, egg foo young and shrimp lo mein , authorities say. Liu was later pronounced dead at the scene after a neighborhood resident found his body and called police. More than $200 was left in his pocket.
Standing before Supreme Court Justice Robert J. Hanophy, Stone said he wanted to apologize to Liu’s widow.
“Why did you do this cruel thing to my family?” asked victim’s wife, Bao Zhu Chen Liu, weeping loudly. “All he was doing was delivering food.”
Stone did not respond, and instead just bowed his head. Stone could have faced life in prison if he had been found guilty of murder at trial.
Liu was the owner of Golden Wok in St. Albans, Queens. He had immigrated from China with his family two years earlier.
Stone was the first of the group to be sentenced. He and Darryl Tyson, 18, pleaded guilty to first-degree robbery. Tyson’s sentencing is set for Nov. 7. Jamel Murphy, 18, another member of the group, pleaded guilty in June. Savage is scheduled to go to trial Nov. 1. Stacy Royster, 18, who is accused of calling in the food order on her cell-phone, is expected to be tried after Savage. Both face murder and robbery charges.
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