KINGMAN — Mohave County jail inmate Gaven Robel, 26, of California was sentenced to 21 years in prison after pleading guilty to 2nd degree murder and fraudulent schemes and artifices.
Robel was arrested on October 30, 2017, for his role in a Mohave County drug ring. Robel and six co-defendants used fake prescriptions to obtain thousands of Oxycodone pills during a period of several months in 2015, said a release from the Arizona Attorney General’s Office.
Three weeks later, Robel attacked and killed his cellmate, 43-year-old Ryan Couch, of Kingman.
“As Couch lay unconscious on the floor of the shared cell, other inmates observed Robel, who was encouraging the inmates to watch, repeatedly stomp on Couch’s head and neck, before jumping off the top bunk onto Couch’s head,” the attorney general’s release said.
Couch was transported to Kingman Regional Medical Center, then transported by air to University Medical Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. He suffered from an orbital eye fracture, multiple skull fractures, and brain bleeding. Couch was placed on life support, then died from his injuries on December 3, 2017.
The investigations were conducted by the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office. Mohave County Judge Billy K. Sipe, Jr. handed down Robel’s sentence in the Arizona Department of Corrections, to be followed by seven years of probation with mental health treatment.