A former Virginia prostitute who drugged her two daughters with melatonin-laced gummy bears before fatally shooting them in the head and killing them decided to carry out the murders after she could no longer use the girls as “leverage” against them ex husband.
Veronica Youngblood, 38, was arrested in August 2018 after shooting her daughters Sharon Castro, 15, and Brooklynn Youngblood, five, in their apartment in McLean, Virginia.
The former sex worker was convicted in March 2023 of two counts of first-degree murder and two counts of aggravated use of a weapon. On Friday she was sentenced to almost 80 years in prison.
Ron Youngblood, 52, says he believes his ex-wife committed the murders to inflict as much harm on him as possible after she decided to stay in Virginia while her ex-husband moved to Missouri.
“They weren’t the most important things in my life – they were my life.” That’s all I really cared about. “If she took this from me, I’ll never get it back.”
Following her conviction in March, Veronica Youngblood was sentenced to 78 years in prison for the murders of her two daughters, whom she shared with her now 52-year-old husband, Ron Youngblood
Ron (left) had planned to move to Missouri with at least one of his children, but his ex-wife instead decided to take revenge and killed them both
Veronica Youngblood (left) and her daughter Sharon Castro, who was shot in the back and chest and died in the hospital in 2018
“Those girls were a bargaining chip for her — a bargaining chip to get what she wanted from me.” “She obviously knew that those girls were the most important thing in my life,” Youngblood told the New York Post.
While Veronica wanted to stay in Virginia, a judge ruled that Ron could move to Missouri and take his only biological daughter with him. She married her husband in 2009.
“When the judge decided that I could stay with Brooklynn, she saw that she had no more tools to use against me, so she decided to get rid of her,” he explained.
“She could do the only thing that could really hurt me, and she’d been trying for years and failing until she murdered my girls.” I wouldn’t have believed her to try to harm me, but I never thought she would have done anything to the girls.’
Brooklynn was shot in the head, while Sharon was shot once in the back and once in the chest and died in the hospital.
Her ex-husband Ron, 52 (pictured) believes the murders were intended to cause him maximum pain after his ex-wife decided to stay in Virginia while he moved to Missouri
Veronica Youngblood is shown with her daughters Sharon Castro and Brooklynn Youngblood. She killed them in a terrible act of revenge
During the trial, Veronica Youngblood pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, but her plea was rejected.
The jury did not believe that “mental illness” played a role in the Youngblood’s decision to give their children sleeping pills before shooting them in their beds.
In a twisted act of revenge, Veronica shot the girls as they slept in her McLean apartment after drugging them on August 5, 2018.
The couple’s oldest daughter survived long enough to call 911 and tell the dispatcher that she had been shot by her own mother.
Jurors heard a recording of that call during Youngblood’s two-week trial. Jurors were so disturbed by what they heard that they asked if they could receive trauma therapy because the call was so traumatic.
As her teenage daughter lay dying, Veronica called Ron and said she hated him and that she had shot the children.
Youngblood killed her children in revenge for her ex-husband Ron (left) and plans to move with her youngest, Brooklynn (right). Veronica married her husband in 2009
She told investigators that after a protracted custody battle, she planned to kill them and herself.
At the time of her trial, Veronica was recorded telling investigators she was guilty and deserved the death penalty for killing her children.
Prosecutors said her actions were manipulative and calculated.
In March of this year, Veronica was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and two counts of aggravated use of a weapon.
She pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity and her lawyer claimed the Argentine native heard voices, but the defense was rejected.
Before she was sentenced Friday, Youngblood spoke for more than 30 minutes about her daughters and the difficulties she had raising them.
Through a Spanish interpreter, she told the judge: “I was a good mother, but something happened, I don’t know how to explain it. “Something exploded in my head.”
Ron Youngblood’s social media pages are full of photos of the children he was in love with
He believes that his ex-wife killed his children to inflict maximum pain on his life
During the sentencing, the jury heard testimony that the murderer’s mother grew up in poverty in Argentina, was physically and sexually abused by family members as a child, and turned to sex work to care for her eldest daughter.
She met her current husband in 2007 when he was stationed there. The two moved to Virginia in 2015 but divorced a year later.
Defense attorneys had called for the two murder sentences to be imposed concurrently rather than consecutively, which would have shortened the sentence from 78 to 42 years.
Fairfax County District Court Judge Randy Bellows said he saw no reason to reverse the jury’s recommendation to run one sentence at a time.
Judge Bellows said in sentencing: “Mothers and fathers have many responsibilities, but none more serious than ensuring the safety of their children. “Tragically, her mother became the instrument of her death.”
Prosecutor Kelsey Gill said the killings were premeditated and that Youngblood had purchased the gun she used just nine days earlier.
Gill told the court: “There are truly no words that can describe the depravity with which Ms. Youngblood planned and carried out the execution of her children.”
Public defender Dawn Butorac said she expects Youngblood to appeal.
Fairfax County Commonwealth’s Attorney Steve Descano, whose office prosecuted the case, said in a statement after the hearing: “There is no outcome that can give these children back the life that was taken from them, but today’s sentence is a measure for ‘justice for her family.’
Ron said he was confident the judge would impose the maximum sentence but would continue to grieve for his two girls.