‘We all would like a reason’: Man gets 70 years for random shooting of truck driver

A 25-year-old man was sentenced to 70 years in prison Monday for fatally shooting a truck driver in 2015 as he delivered gas at a Fort Worth convenience store.

A Tarrant County jury had earlier taken roughly half an hour before finding Lendon Lee Adams guilty of murder in the death of Jonathan Luevano.

Adams has appealed.

Luevano, 29, had just delivered gasoline to the QuikTrip at 5700 Bryan Irvin Road and was in the passenger seat of his truck, apparently doing paperwork, when he was shot about 1:30 a.m. on May 7, 2015.

Surveillance cameras showed a 2009 white Ford Mustang circling a set of gas pumps before driving toward the truck. Several gunshots rang out before the Mustang drove away on Bryant Irvin Road.

The motive behind the shooting remains unclear.

“We all would like a reason,” said Tracey Kapsidelis, who prosecuted Adams along with Michele Hartmann.

The victim and suspect did not know each other. Just before the shooting, Adams had gone into the convenience store and tried to purchase alcohol.

“The clerk took it from him and testified he told him, ‘I can’t sell it to you. It’s past time,’ ” Kapsidelis said. “He walked out calmly. He was in the store maybe 40 or 50 seconds.”

Defense attorney Joetta Keene, who defended Adams along with attorney Jim Renforth, says that Adams suffers from a severe mental illness and “was under a delusion that he was under attack.”

“With proper mental health treatment, this would not have happened,” Keene said Tuesday. “Now two families have lost their sons. I really hope that one day we realize as a society that we can do better in how we fund mental health in our state. So many crimes would not even occur if we did.”

Adams had surfaced as a suspect in the case early on.

About two hours after the shooting — before Luevano’s body had even been discovered — Benbrook police spotted Adams driving a white Mustang erratically in the parking lot of a doughnut shop.

He had a Glock tucked in his waistband. Adams was cited for possession of drug paraphernalia and released.

After learning of the shooting and description of the suspect vehicle, Benbrook police alerted Fort Worth homicide detectives about their earlier encounter with Adams. Investigators tried to locate Adams at his address but he was not there.

The detectives had returned to the gas station when homicide Detective Jerry Cedillo spotted the Mustang in front of his car at a red light. Investigators followed Adams until patrol officers could stop Adams.

In a subsequent interview with detectives, Adams denied involvement in the shooting.

A search of his car, however, would reveal two handguns — a 9mm Glock and Colt .380 — as well as three spent cartridge casings.

He was arrested a day later in Parker County after ballistics tests confirmed Luevano had been shot in the neck with the Glock found in Adam’s trunk.

Hartmann didn’t ask the jury for a specific prison sentence for Adams, just that justice be done.

Defense attorneys had asked for leniency.

Keene said that instead, the state will spend hundred of thousands of dollars housing Adams.

“It would be so much more cost-effective if we spent that money on the front end and sweet families like Jonathan’s would not be suffering his loss,” she said. “It’s just a sad case all the way around.”

Adams will have to serve 30 years before becoming eligible for parole.

Detective E. Pate, lead investigator in the case, said he was satisfied with the jury’s sentence. He said Luevano, who had recently moved to Fort Worth from California before his death, was an innocent man who deserved justice.

“As homicide detectives, we see people who make poor decisions which lead to bad consequences on a daily basis,” Pate said. “The only thing Jonathan Luevano did wrong was be a hard worker.”

This story was originally published October 31, 2017 at 1:12 PM with the headline "‘We all would like a reason’: Man gets 70 years for random shooting of truck driver."