Ivy League lawyer, 35, sentenced to life without parole after beating and strangling his girlfriend, 27, to death and leaving her body in a bath full of ice
- Jason Bohn, 35, has been sentenced to life in prison for murdering his live-in girlfriend, Danielle Thomas, 27
- Thomas died of neck compression and blunt-force trauma and was found in the bathtub of their Queens apartment in June 2012
- At the sentencing hearing Tuesday, Thomas' grandmother called Bohn 'a bully and a coward'
- Her mother said life 'will never be good for me ever again'
- Bohn said to them: 'I don't know how this happened'
- Bohn and his defense team claimed it was manslaughter but the jury didn't believe them
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An Ivy League lawyer convicted of beating and strangling his girlfriend to death in their Queens apartment has been sentenced to life without parole, a judge ruled Tuesday.
Jason Bohn, 35, was found guilty last month of first-degree murder in the brutal June 2012 slaying of Danielle Thomas, a financial analyst for Weight Watchers who was killed in the Astoria home she shared with Bohn.
She died of neck compression and blunt-force trauma, had lacerations on her face, mouth and chest and was found lying in a bath full of ice.
Before the sentence was handed down, the court heard from Thomas' family, with the words of her grandmother, Juanita Hardgrove, causing Bohn to break down in tears, The New York Post reported.
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Life without parole: Jason Bohn (left), was found guilty of strangling his girlfriend Danielle Thomas (right) and will be behind bars for the rest of his life
Sentenced: Jason Bohn, pictured, was emotional in court on Tuesday
Guilty: Bohn apologized before he was sentenced, saying 'I don't know what to say. I don't know how this happened'
Emotional: Bohn is seen tearing up in court in this photograph as he apologizes to the family of slain girlfriend Danielle Thomas
'I’m a cancer survivor, and I thought that hearing I had cancer would be the worse news until I got that call that you murdered my precious Dani,' Hardgrove said.
'Only a bully and coward would do this to such a beautiful woman.
'We couldn’t even see her face in the casket to say goodbye because of what you did to her body but her spirit will last with us always.'
Thomas' mother, Jaime Thomas-Bright, said that despite being a victim of constant abuse at the hands of Bohn, her daughter still wanted to marry the man she loved.
'I once asked Danielle three weeks before you killed her if you’d propose what she’d say,' Thomas-Bright said in a victim’s impact statement
'And she smiled and said ''yes''.'
Thomas' grandmother Juanita Hardgrov, pictured, said in court 'Only a bully and coward would do this to such a beautiful woman'
Heartbreaking: Jamie Thomas-Bright, Thomas' mother, said 'Life will never be good for me ever again'
'Life will never be good for me ever again.
'I’ll never get to be a grandmother and, Judge Aloise, I think I would have been a great grandma. I dread getting old.'
Bohn tearfully apologized before he was sentenced, saying, through tears: 'I don't know what to say. I don't know how this happened.'
What made the murder of Thomas even more harrowing was how close she came to escaping her dangerous partner.
Weeks prior to her death, Thomas told police Bohn had beaten her a month earlier, leaving her on crutches and with two black eyes, NBC New York reported.
He called her cellphone while she was at the police station and Thomas put it on speaker, allowing detectives to hear Bohn threaten to bash her skull in and 'hunt her down like a dog'.
Weeks prior to her death, Thomas told police Bohn had beaten her a month earlier
Convicted: Bohn reportedly broke an order of protection when he killed girlfriend Danielle Thomas in 2012
Bohn and his defense team claimed it was manslaughter, but the jury did not believe them
Captured: Bohn is brought into Queens Supreme Court in handcuffs on July 23, 2012 after the body of his girlfriend was found. He has been sentenced to life without parole for her murder
Brutal death: Danielle Thomas had moved from Florida to New York to be with her boyfriend in Queens
Bohn was arrested that day and Thomas was granted an order of protection.
Charges of assault and aggravated harassment were pending against him when she died.
Prosecutors revealed in Janaury that, on the night she died, Thomas had returned home to protect her dog, Schnoozer, even though a friend had offered to take her to a hotel.
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ShareProsecutor Patrick O'Connor told the jury panel that Bohn had threatened to kill the black-and-white pooch in the past, and Thomas rushed home in a bid to save her pet.
‘It was for the love of her dog,’ the prosecutor said. ‘She was afraid for her dog.’
One of the most compelling pieces of evidence an unintentional voicemail, wherein Thomas could be heard saying 'I can't breathe' as Bohn strangled her.
Loss: Bohn blamed Thomas' lying, stress, alcohol and his own abusive past for the murder; in court, the prosecution said the 27-year-old rushed home to protect her dog, Schnoozer (right), from Bohn
On the chilling recording, a man believed to be Bohn relentlessly questions why Thomas made a phone call to a number with a 508 area code.
Bohn is then heard strangling the 27-year-old before letting go as she pleads with him and tries to answer his questions, DNAinfo New York reported.
She struggles to breath as she answers over and over: 'I don't know... Jason, I love you.'
He then replies: 'You have five seconds and then...and then I'm going to kill you.
He continues: 'I'm going to let you up and then you need to answer quickly or else you die... Danielle, why did you call that number?
'Danielle you are so stupid. You think I'm going to stop, I won't stop.'
It is unclear whether the voicemail came from the victim or alleged killer's cellphone.
Missed: Bohn, right, had been violent in the past and Miss Thomas (pictured left with a relative) had a protection order against him at the time of her death
Neighbors called police to check on Thomas after hearing a fight and her dead body was found in the ice-filled bathtub.
Beside it were two handwritten notes written by Bohn.
One pledged his love for her, while the other said: 'It was an accident. It was an accident.'
Bohn had fled the couple's apartment in Queens with his girlfriend's phone, which he used to assure her family she was fine.
He was eventually tracked down at a restaurant in White Plains.
Bohn's attorney, Todd Greenberg, previously said his client had been suffering from emotional disturbances, but wouldn't say whether his client had a history of mental illness.
They had tried to convince the jury toward a lesser charge of manslaughter, using stories of childhood abuse, but it failed to sway the jury.
Bohn is now expected to die in prison.
Grim discovery: Danielle Thomas' body was found in the Queens apartment in a bath full of ice in June 2012 after neighbors called the police following the noisy fight
Murder scene: Thomas was found murdered in a bathtub of ice at the couple's Astoria, New York home
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