23 years to life

Ashtabula County man pleads guilty to murder

WARREN -- An Ashtabula County man was sentenced to 23 years to life in prison Tuesday for aggravated murder stemming from a late April shooting that left one woman dead and another injured.

Douglas Day, 23, of Roaming Shores, pleaded guilty to aggravated murder and attempted aggravated murder with firearms specifications and was sentenced by Trumbull County Common Pleas Judge Peter Kontos. Day, who will be sent to the Lorain Correctional Institution, will be eligible for parole in 23 years.

Day shot and killed Cathryn Lambert, 48, and wounded her daughter, Tiffany Lambert, 26, who is the mother of Day's children.

"The depths of your depravity know no bounds," Kontos said before pronouncing sentence.

Tiffany Lambert, who was in a relationship with Day for six years, said during a victim's impact statement on Tuesday that Day was abusive and controlling. In one of the worst fights they had, Day broke her nose, held a knife to her throat and poured gasoline next to her and acted like he was going to light it, Lambert said.

Lambert said during another fight, Day choked her while she was holding her infant daughter, and he got angry any time she tried to visit her mother.

The night of the murder, Day shot at the Lamberts 13 times as they tried to drive away from a state Route 87 apartment in Mesopotamia. Tiffany Lambert had called her mother for a ride because Day was drunk and threatened her life after shooting one of his guns into the downstairs neighbor's home.

"This man is a danger to society and deserves to suffer in jail for the rest of his life so he doesn't have the chance to hurt anyone else," Tiffany Lambert said. "He deserves to feel the pain I feel everyday missing the beautiful angel I called mom."

Dwight Miller, Cathryn Lambert's brother, said he understands a plea agreement spares the family from re-living Day's cowardly act, "but it hardly feels like justice."

"Our society should have no tolerance for someone who would take the life of a person who presented no physical threat to them, and in fact was fleeing," Miller said.