Almost three years to the day after 23-year-old Chandler Sweaney was shot to death, Shelley Larrick finally had an opportunity to address the man who pulled the trigger and killed her son on Jan. 27. Larrick spoke about her son's generous spirit and how Sweaney always wanted to help and serve others.
“The thing is, Chandler has probably already forgiven you,” Larrick said to Paul Morales in a Greene County courtroom. “I haven’t.”
Morales, 31, was convicted by a Greene County jury in late 2023 of second-degree murder, armed criminal action and other weapons charges for Sweaney’s death on Feb. 1, 2021.
Following the victim impact statements from Larrick and other family members, Morales gave a more-than 15 minute statement in which he denied being the shooter. Circuit Judge Jerry Harmison sentenced Morales to 55 years in prison with credit for time served.
Throughout the investigation and trial, Sweaney was described as an innocent victim who unknowingly rented a room to a drug dealer, Rickey Rose.
Morales, along with Timothy Johnson, came to Sweaney’s residence in the 2800 block of West Chestnut Expressway to rob Rose the night of Feb. 1, 2021. Sweaney was shot while he was sitting on the couch in his living room and watching television.
At a hearing in 2023, Morales refused a plea deal with a prison term of 30 years with the possibility of parole, which would have dismissed the armed criminal action charge.
Johnson, 34, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and first-degree assault. He will be sentenced in March.
Rose pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 10 years in prison with probation denied. He was remanded to custody of the Greene County Sheriff. Rose also faces federal gun and drug charges.
As part of their plea deals, Johnson and Rose testified for the prosecution in Morales’ trial.
While both Johnson and Morales were known gang members and the shooting happened during the course of a drug-related robbery, investigators say Sweaney was not involved in any illegal activity.
And though Morales was the person found to have shot and killed Sweaney, Johnson and Rose were charged and convicted of murder because of Missouri’s rule that a person is culpable of murder if they commit a felony or attempt to commit a felony and another person is killed as a result.
Prosecutors and investigators say Morales and Johnson went to Sweaney’s residence in the 2800 block of West Chestnut Expressway to rob Rose, a known drug dealer and Sweaney’s roommate.
During that robbery, Sweaney was shot by Morales. Rose was shot in the leg by Johnson.
Rose, Johnson and Morales are currently in the Greene County Jail. Morales is awaiting transportation to the a Missouri Department of Corrections prison. Johnson will be sentenced in March. Rose is also facing federal drug and gun charges.
Family frustrated Morales does not take responsibility
Kali Sweaney, Chandler Sweaney’s sister-in-law, was among those who gave victim impact statements Jan. 27. She called Chandler Sweaney “goofy and fun to be around.”
“He was an amazing uncle and brother,” she said.
Kali Sweaney spoke about how proud Chandler Sweaney was to purchase a home at such a young age. She also described what it was like to go into that house after his murder and see the damage and dry blood everywhere.
“It was extremely traumatic,” she said. “I’ve never seen anything like it. … The home Chandler worked so hard to buy was a crime scene. It didn’t seem fair.”
Kali Sweaney went on to talk about how Morales refused to accept any responsibility, tried to fire his attorney and refused to plead guilty.
“He made a mockery of this court, trying to represent himself,” she said. “It was as if Paul was rubbing his crimes in our faces.”
She recalled how the family saw graphic photographs of the crime scene at the trial, which could have been avoided if Morales had accepted the plea deal.
“He retraumatized us just to buy himself some time,” Kali Sweaney said.
‘I'm not the shooter'
Before Morales was sentenced, he addressed the judge and Sweaney’s family. He apologized to Sweaney’s family “for having to go through this” but stopped short of taking responsibility for Sweaney’s death.
“The finger has been pointed at me as the shooter,” Morales said. “I’m not the shooter.”
He then spoke for about 15 minutes, claiming no drugs were actually exchanged that night. He also claimed Johnson was the person who shot Sweaney.
“I wanted to take the stand,” he said. “I didn’t get to present the truth and I might never get the chance again.”
Judge Harmison pushed back on Morales’ claims about wanting to testify at the trial. Harmison remined Morales that during the trial, Harmison asked Morales — out of the presence of the jury — if Morales wanted to testify and Morales said no.
Harmison described Morales’ criminal history as “alarming,” noting how many times Morales committed more crimes within months of being released from jail or prison.
“Nobody is perfect. Everybody makes mistakes,” Harmison said. “I expect people to learn from their mistakes.”
Harmison sentenced Morales to life in prison (30 years under Missouri law) with the possibility of parole for the charge of second-degree murder, 15 years for the charge of armed criminal action, and 10 years for the charge of unlawful possession of a firearm. Those sentences are to run consecutively, for a total of 55 years.
‘Do better. Be Better’
Following the hearing, Larrick said she was thankful the judge gave Morales the maximum sentence possible.
“This does give us closure on the path to justice,” Larrick said. “But the other path — I gotta tell you, it's going to take the rest of our lives trying to find some sort of peace in our family[...]
“We are so determined to pull together tighter and tighter as a family,” she said. “But I can tell you, it is so hard to get up every day, and this feeling in the pit of my stomach after three years is still there. I pray for it to go away every day.”
Larrick said she was proud of family members who gave victim impact statements at the sentencing hearing.
“It was hard, because it's a reminder of how much devastation that (Chandler Sweaney's) murder has left on the whole family,” she said.
Since her son’s death, Larrick has attended the court hearings for Morales, Rose and Johnson. She is always flanked by up to 30 friends and family members. Larrick and her supporters often wore shirts that say “Do better. Be Better.”
In an earlier interview with the Hauxeda, Larrick explained it was just something she said a few times at her son’s funeral and his friends seemed to “latch onto” the phrase.
“I said, ‘We all just have to do better, be better.’ I said it many times at the funeral, I guess,” she had said. “His friends, I saw on Facebook afterwards, they were saying, ‘Do better. Be better.”
Larrick described her son as being a very bright young man who wanted to help others. He got very good grades in school, played football until he was 15, sang in the school's chamber choir and played tuba in band.
Because they had relatives who struggled with substance misuse, Larrick said she and her son were both active in Al-Anon and Alateen, support groups for family members whose loved ones misuse alcohol and/or drugs.
“He would go to Burrell (Behavioral Health) and talk to youth, go to schools, and he would tell other kids about Alateen and what it was,” she had said. “So the hard part is processing that the very thing that we’ve worked so hard to break the cycle and to help other people break that cycle — it’s the same group of people who got him killed, you know. It’s just hard to reconcile that.
“The root of this is still addiction, because this roommate that he let in was an addict,” Larrick said. “(Rose) was only there two weeks, but that’s the reason Paul Morales and Tim ever came into that home. Chandler just happened to be there.”
