Jason Cleveland, 40, will face the rest of his life behind prison bars after an emotional sentencing at the London courthouse.
He was sentenced this morning for the Fiddler’s Green apartment murders. He will also face no parol for 25 years.
He brutally murdered 50-year old Kevin Walkey and 31-year old Robert Ratz Jr. at his apartment. He lured the men by means of fraudulent ads posted on Kijiji about subletting the apartment.
Walkey’s decomposing body was found covered by a blanket in the couch in his apartment by a maintenance worker who received numerous complaint calls about a weird odour coming from inside the room. Police later arrested Cleveland and he admitted to police in killing Walkey and that he also killed another man, 31-year old Robert Ratz Jr., and that his body was in a recycling bin in the back of his closet.
Both men were killed from repeated blows to the head.
Cleveland pleaded guilty to two counts of second degree murder in the 2013 deaths and was remorseful at the London courthouse. He accepted full responsibility for the deaths.
Justice Thomas Heeney addressed the court saying that he was a ‘savage’ for the murders and also granted that he sees mental health treatment while in prison.
“My son wasn’t there for 24 hours and he was murdered,” says the father of Robert Ratz Jr., Robert Ratz Sr. while speaking to the reporters afterwards. “I have a replay in my mind all the time, I can see him clubbing my son. He clubbed him seven times in the head… seven times.”
“You’re never, ever going to be satisfied, I mean, as far as I’m concerned that guy deserves the death penalty. It’s just been so much and so overwhelming, you’re never going to be satisfied,” says the brother of Robert Ratz Jr., Troy Cooper.
Cleveland spent six years in jail after he plead guilty of manslaughter in the death of his business partner in 2003.