Lexington recognizes crime victims’ rights’ week with proclamation

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WTVQ) — As National Crime victims’ rights’ week continues… Mayor Linda Gorton officially delivering a proclamation to commemorate the week in Lexington.

“Jonathan was a people person. He connected with people. There was never a stranger in his life. opportunity, knocked and he took advantage of it. He very much lived in the moment,” says Mary Krueger who is remembering her son, Jonathan Krueger.
He had just turned 22, when was shot and killed on East Maxwell in Transylvania Park in 2015, a case that took seven years in the justice system.

“The system is set up that we should not be visible because it’s about the accused, it’s about their rights and I get that, but I feel like we need to be visible,” she adds.

As the years continue to pass by, Mary says the loss still feels very present, “it’s in my mind like it was yesterday, that’s why sometimes it feels like it just happened and other times it feels like an eternity.”

Krueger says the pain only mounted in the fight to get justice for Jonathan. The case kept getting delayed,  but she recalls one moment that really struck her the wrong way, during a felony mediation meeting.

“Well, that was the one brief that the attorney wrote and that really upset me that she wrote that two wrongs don’t make a right. I mean, yes, he’s missed five years of birthdays and funerals and all that. Jonathan has missed the rest forever. I mean, he had dreams too and he didn’t get any chance,” she also said of going through the trial.

On Thursday, Mary shared Jonathan’s story for Crime Victims’ Rights’ Week in Lexington, alongside members of her family, and even through her pain, she expressed gratitude.

“I feel gratitude that I even got to go through this process. As crazy as that sounds because there’s so many survivors who don’t even get that chance because no one has been charged with the crime and they’re left with no answers. I don’t have many answers, but I know more than a lot of these other people that are going through this and my heart aches for them,” said Krueger.

She says, if she had known the last time she would ever get to hug her son was on his 22nd birthday, “I know he left knowing how much he was loved. I’m hoping he died knowing how much he was loved. And if he was here today, it would be wonderful.”

The three men involved in the 2015 robbery and shooting death of Jonathan were sentenced last April to a combined 89 years in prison.