MA man sentenced in
death of Chiara Levin

BOSTON - A Boston man will serve 27 1/2 to 30 years in prison for the crossfire killing of a visiting Kentucky woman in 2007.

A judge on Friday sentenced Casimiro Barros to the maximum after he was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon in the death of 22-year-old Chiara Levin.

Prosecutors say Barros, 22, and Manuel Andrade, 35, were shooting at each other on a Boston street when a stray bullet hit Levin in the head. She and friends had gone to a party with Andrade after meeting him in a nightclub.

Levin, a Danville, Ky., native and University of Michigan graduate, had recently moved to New York City to take a job as a booking agent. She was in Boston to visit friends and attend a 90th birthday party for her aunt.

"Violence has destroyed my soul. I am broken. I am lost," Levin's mother, Maria Levin, said in an impact statement she read at the sentencing.

"I scream and cry every single day until I have no more tears. I cannot smile and do not see any end to my pain," she said.

Levin's aunt, Lenore Wolbarsht, said in a prepared statement that she suffers sleepless nights thinking about her niece's "dreadful end."

"But there comes a moment when I try to rejoice in Chiara's life as it was, and not as it ended," Wolbarsht said. "If justice has been done, so be it, but no one in our family will ever forget the horror of the loss and the hate that brought us such sadness."

Levin was shot while she sat in a Cadillac Escalade with Andrade as he and Barros exchanged fire outside an after-hours house party. Prosecutors said Andrade had earlier shot one of Barros' close friends in the shoulder.

Barros plans to appeal his convictions. Andrade is expected to stand trial next month for his alleged role in Levin's death.