WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — A 52-year-old Orlando man, who was spared life in prison after being convicted of manslaughter, was sentenced to 15 years in prison in the death of his girlfriend in 2019.
Circuit Judge Daliah Weiss, who called Rochelle Demmings' death a family's "worst nightmare realized," sentenced Ronald Gamble for the maximum sentence of manslaughter on Wednesday. A jury convicted him of the lesser sentence instead of second-degree murder on Sept. 14.
“He took something so precious and shouldn’t get away with it,” Latierra Allen, Demmings’ niece, told the judge. He received credit of 3 1/2 years in jail.
After Gamble beat his girlfriend so severely that she died inside her home at the Grand Isles condominiums on Haverhill Road, he then drove to Orlando on Dec. 13, 2019, before returning to South Florida and calling 911 three days later, police said.
Gamble was arrested five months later on May 19, 2020.
He was extradited from the Orange County Jail to the Palm Beach County Jail.
Gamble told police that he had gotten into an argument with Demmings and left for Orlando. Upon his return, Gamble said, he found her body and called police.
"I'm not gonna lie -- I hit her," Gamble told Detective Darren MacCarthy, according to the report.
According to the report, Gamble explained that he might have hit her head twice, "but I know I hit her really hard because I hurt my hand."
When asked if he could have hit Demmings hard enough to kill her, Gamble answered, "It was not my intention."
He admitted to manslaughter before jurors even began deliberating.
