WICHITA, Kan. — Ricky Alderete, the man who stole the Jackie Robinson statue from McAdams Park, will serve roughly 15 years in prison after a judge sentenced him Friday in multiple cases.
The sentencing included the combining of three cases, including one for which he was on probation during the Jan. 25 heist. The bulk of the prison sentence is 13½ years for aggravated burglary on Feb. 1.
Alderete got 18 months for aggravated criminal damage for stealing the statue. He also was ordered to pay $41,500 in restitution for the statue to League 42, which serves hundreds of primarily inner-city and low-income youth.
The league’s name is in recognition of Robinson, the first Black player to play in Major League Baseball. He broke the color barrier when he suited up as No. 42 for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947.
Before being sentenced, Alderete apologized to the city, his family and League 42.
“I let fentanyl take over me and made a lot of poor decisions. I am not going to deny that. I never meant to hurt anybody,” he said. “I am embarrassed, I’m ashamed. Whatever you do today I accept. I am ready for that. I believe I am where I am supposed to be right now because at the rate I am going, I might have been dead.”
Judge Tyler Roush compared the crime to to “going and hacking off a leg of the Keeper of the Plains.”
“The city was on edge,” he said. “It was a direct attack against some of the things that are good … in our community.”
Roush said he had empathy for Alderete’s decades of drug addiction and acknowledged that prison is not the best place to rehabilitate. However, he said, Alderete has 25 convictions and had many opportunities over the years to address his drug issues, and the severity of his crimes warranted hefty prison sentences.
He denied public defender Jorge M. De Hoyos motion for a lesser sentence of either probation or 46 months in prison. Roush said he would have leaned toward the maximum sentence had it not been for a plea agreement.
The aggravated burglary carries a sentence between 154 months and 172 months, and the aggravated criminal damage for stealing the statue carries a sentence between 40 and 46 months. The sentences for interference with law enforcement and criminal damage in February and theft, making false information and identity theft in the case tied to the statue will run concurrent with the roughly 15 years.
Days after the statue was stolen, amid a citywide manhunt, it was found burned in Garvey Park. Investigators say Alderete and at least two others tried to pawn the statue for drug money. No one else has been arrested or charged.
Donations poured in from all over the country, including $100,000 from the MLB, to rebuild the 275-pound, bronze statue. It has been rebuilt and was put in place Friday. An unveiling ceremony is scheduled for Monday.
League 42 director Bob Lutz spoke before the sentencing, saying he had talked with Alderete and his family in the past weeks. Lutz said he has no ill will toward Alderete, who could have benefited from what the league does.
Afterward, as Alderete’s family cried behind him in the hallway, Lutz said the sentencing was “bittersweet, difficult, unfortunate. Feel bad for the family.”
De Hoyos, in arguing against the sentence, showed pictures of Alderete with his family and explained that time in prison would only be more detrimental to them all. He also didn’t think it was possible for Alderete, who came into the courtroom shackled and in a prison jumpsuit, to pay the $41,500.
“Ricky Alderete doesn’t have a penny to his name,” he said. “Even the clothes on his back don’t belong to him.”
De Hoyos would not say if he plans to appeal the decision.
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