A Maryland man was sentenced to life in prison Friday for a gruesome 2019 murder in Germantown in which he beat his victim with a pipe wrench and slit her throat with a pocket knife.

       Lawrence Sakkestad, 36, stood still inside a Montgomery County courtroom with his hands clasped before him as Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge Richard Jordan handed down the order.

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       “As I think Mr. Sakkestad knows, this was — to use a word that really is an understatement — brutal,” Jordan said.

       Moments before, Sakkestad had seemingly accepted his fate.

       “I recognize that it’s a terrible thing that I’ve done,” he said. “And I know that no words can make up for that. I truly feel that I deserve the punishment that I get today.”

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       The conclusion of the case came as a relief to the family and friends of Jennifer Sparks, who was 39 on Sept. 8, 2019, when she met Sakkestad for the first time inside a 7-Eleven. He persuaded her to go to his nearby apartment, where others also had gathered. The next day, when they were alone, Sakkestad attacked her.

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       “I’m kind of glad there isn’t a death penalty in Maryland,” said Sparks’s mother, Martha Cook. “That’s too easy. He shouldn’t have one minute of comfort.”

       Earlier coverage: Sakkestad covered in blood when police arrived

       Born in Maryland, Sakkestad grew up to be a bright but deeply troubled man, suffering from mental illness and substance abuse, according to his detailed criminal record filed in court. He had picked up more than 10 convictions — including cases of assault, theft and drug possession — and been in and out of jail before the murder.

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       On Sept. 9, 2019, when police were called to his apartment, they found Sakkestad “naked and covered in blood,” Assistant State’s Attorney Dermot Garrett said during Sakkestad’s earlier plea hearing.

       “He told the officers, who interviewed him that he had been hearing voices, that the voices had been exacerbated by the crack cocaine that he was using,” Garrett said. “The voices had told him to kill Ms. Sparks, that he then bludgeoned her with a wrench-like object, and he also used a knife. And that he did that until she was dead.”

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       Evidence from the scene suggested that Sparks had tried to get away from Sakkestad by running to a bathroom. It’s an image her mother said she has trouble getting out of her head.

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       “She must have been running for her life,” Cook said.

       Cook acknowledged her daughter had her own struggles with substance abuse. She had a dark streak, her mother said, but one often laced with kindness and humor. The poems of Edgar Allan Poe were a favorite.

       “Even with everything she went through, she looked for the best in people,” Cook said. “She had an innocence about her, she could be gullible. I think that put her in bad situations.”

       Sparks grew up wanting to be veterinarian. “She certainly was smart enough,” Cook said.

       Shortly before her death, Sparks found a crow on a sidewalk, took it in, and tried to nurse it back to health. The bird didn’t make it.

       “She was devastated over that crow,” Cook said. “She was heartbroken over it.”

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