A Connecticut drive-by shooter will spend 30 years in prison for killing a man on a New Haven street — but the sentence came only after prosecutors traded away a murder charge, and the system had already failed to stop him before a body hit the pavement.

Three cases across three states this week expose the same broken machinery from different angles: a plea bargain that downgraded murder to manslaughter, an acquittal built on bought testimony, and a Chicago aunt who was a known danger to a child the system handed back to her.

In New Haven, Joseph Dominick, 21, was sentenced Wednesday to 40 years in prison, suspended after 30, with five years of probation, according to the state Division of Criminal Justice. He pleaded guilty in July to one count of first-degree manslaughter with a firearm. That was the plea deal. What it replaced: original charges of murder, carrying a pistol without a permit, and possession of a large-capacity magazine — all of which were dropped, the Hartford Courant reported.

On Nov. 14, 2023, Dominick fired from a stolen black Volkswagen Tiguan into 29-year-old Shaquille Chazz Pearson, who was found lying in the road with gunshot wounds and died at Yale New Haven Hospital. Dominick was 19 at the time. Police identified him as a suspect, but not until January 2025 — more than a year later. The murder charge vanished into the plea agreement. The illegal gun charge vanished. The illegal magazine charge vanished. Supervisory Assistant State's Attorney Adrienne Russo and Assistant State's Attorney Thomas Finnucan prosecuted the case. Judge Tracy Lee Dayton imposed the sentence.

Down in Baton Rouge, the system produced a different kind of failure. Trayvon McKenzie, 19, was acquitted Thursday of second-degree murder in the January 2024 shooting death of 22-year-old Malaak Ross during what prosecutors called a drug deal robbery. The case rested entirely on the testimony of two accomplices — Keith Augustine, 20, and Dajuan Waxter, 25 — who cut plea deals in exchange for their cooperation, the Baton Rouge Advocate reported. Defense attorney Peter Dudley hammered that point at trial. A detective admitted no DNA could be recovered from 16 shell casings or a gun-mounted light found at the scene due to rain. The physical evidence matched the accomplices' stories, but the accomplices had every incentive to shape those stories to save themselves. The jury bought the doubt.

And in Chicago, Victoria Moreno, 38, pleaded guilty Wednesday to first-degree murder after pushing her 3-year-old nephew Josiah Bell Brown off Navy Pier and into Lake Michigan in September 2022. The boy spent six days in critical condition before dying of drowning complications, the Cook County Medical Examiner ruled it a homicide, according to Us Weekly. Moreno was sentenced to 40 years.

But here is what the system knew before the boy died: Moreno had a prior incident with Josiah and other children at Navy Pier. She was on medication for multiple diagnosed mental health conditions — anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder. She was not allowed to drive. The day she killed Josiah, she stole a relative's truck keys and snuck out of the house with the boy, prosecutors said. Surveillance footage showed her letting the toddler crawl under a fence near the water before pushing him in. Witnesses said she did nothing to help. When a Chicago police officer asked her what happened, she shrugged.

Three cases. Three states. Three dead. In Connecticut, a killer gets a plea deal that erases the worst charges. In Louisiana, a jury acquits because the state's witnesses were literally paid with their own freedom. In Illinois, a woman with a documented history of dangerous behavior around a specific child was left alone with that child anyway. The system didn't malfunction. It operated exactly as designed — and ordinary Americans keep paying the price.