A teenager from upstate New York has been sentenced to a lengthy prison term following his involvement in the execution-style murder of another young boy.

On Wednesday, 19-year-old Ny’Zhon Thomas received a sentence of 24 years to life for second-degree murder. In addition, he was handed 15-year sentences for two counts of criminal possession of a weapon, though these sentences will run concurrently with the murder sentence.

In delivering the sentence, Onondaga County Court Judge Melinda McGunnigle offered harsh criticism of Thomas’s actions.

“He was basically walked into the woods and executed,” the judge said, according to a recording of the proceedings obtained by Syracuse.com. “It wasn’t a youthful indiscretion.”

Thomas is one of three individuals accused of luring 15-year-old Karon Works into a wooded area of Lower Onondaga Park in Syracuse in early December 2023. The 16-acre park became the scene of a brutal crime in which the trio allegedly used two 9 mm handguns to shoot the victim multiple times at close range, leaving him for dead.

The tragic incident unfolded on December 11, 2023, at approximately 8 p.m. Works was discovered in the park and taken to Upstate University Hospital, where he later died from his injuries, as previously reported by a local online news outlet.

The case also involves two other teenagers, Caleb Gibson, 16, and Ja’kye Jameson, whose age has not been disclosed. Both are charged with second-degree murder and criminal possession of a weapon. Prosecutors have not specified who fired the fatal shots but maintain that all three worked together in the crime. The legal proceedings for Gibson and Jameson are still underway.

In September, Thomas pleaded guilty to the charges against him – but the order of events was not without some drama.

During the hearing, the judge harshly upbraided the since-condemned teen for his late-stage efforts to elude some level of culpability.

“You understood and you pled guilty,” McGunnigle recounted. “Yet then [in] the pre-sentence report, you try and deny that. And the probation officer indicates that other than your plea of guilty, you have failed to accept responsibility for your actions.”

The judge went on like this, at length:

You indicated in your pre-sentence report that your lawyer and your family pressured you to take this time because you knew how much time you were facing after trial. And that’s the reason people plead out. But then you also say: “Why would I do something to someone I didn’t know? or who I had never talked to?” You deny responsibility although you pled guilty.

The judge also recounted the details of the slaying.

“Today is about accountability for those choices that you made – the decision that you made to walk Mr. Works into an execution,” McGunnigle said. “He was shot multiple times in his torso, his arm, his legs.”

The defense, for their part, pushed for a sentence at the lower end of the scale based on Thomas’ upbringing, post-arrest education, and age at the time of the crime. The minimum sentence in the Empire State for second-degree murder is 15 years behind bars.

The judge pushed back a bit there.

“You were only 17,” she said. “Mr. Works was only 15. You both had your whole lives ahead of you.”

The prosecution also rubbished those entreaties.

Assistant District Attorney Rob Moran dismissed the purportedly “awful and tragic and sad” story presented by the defense, taking particular aim at a section of a defense-commissioned pre-sentence report which contained “generic language” about the brain development of young men and their susceptibility to impulses.

“That is quite simply not this case,” Moran intoned. “Three young men lured Karon Works into his death. They spent the greater part of half an hour with him, all clearly knowing exactly what the plan was, what their intent was, and that was to assassinate him about a half an hour later. This was not an impulsive act. This was a plan. This is a plan executed by these three men, one of whom stands here before you today.”

The state pushed for the maximum sentence of 25 years to life in prison. In the end, with a nod to Thomas’ life before his time as a killer, the judge largely sided with the state in meting out the punishment.

“I’m sorry about the upbringing that you’ve had,” McGunnigle said before later noting that the defendant’s life is not yet wholly decided. “Despite whatever sentence I give you, you still will have a life. You can continue in state prison to get these certificates to earn a degree so that once you are released, you can go on to be a better person and hopefully…go down the right path. But Mr. Works will never have the opportunity to do anything further in his life and his family will never have the opportunity to be with him. Therefore, you must be held accountable.”