Man gets 10 years for killing ex-girlfriend

Friday, Sept. 9, 2005 | 9:14 a.m.

A 23-year-old man was sentenced to 10 years to life in prison Thursday for killing his 24-year-old former girlfriend in 2003.

Jeremy Crozier previously pleaded guilty to second-degree murder for the death of Rie Shibuya, a 24-year-old UNLV student from Japan.

Police said Shibuya's friends went to her apartment in the 1200 block of South Torrey Pines Drive to check on her and found her body in the living room wrapped in a sheet.

An autopsy found that Rie Shibuya had been strangled about two weeks before her body was discovered.

In court Thursday Crozier stepped short of accepting full responsibility for Rie Shibuya's death as he once again said he acted in self-defense.

"I just wanted to apologize to Mr. Shibuya," Crozier said. "I wish this never would have happened. Given the circumstances I did what I had to do. Hopefully one day I'll be able to offer the family some closure."

Crozier reiterated the story he told police officers saying Rie Shibuya came at him with a knife and he sidestepped her and "put my arm around her neck." He added that he wasn't sure if he had "caused her death."

District Judge Donald Mosley told Crozier that it was "a little hard for me to believe you (Crozier) were defending yourself" as he reasoned if Rie Shibuya had the body frame of most Japanese women he knew she would be slight and hardly a physical threat.

When Rie Shibuya's father, Kiyosi Shibuya, who flew in from Japan to speak, addressed the court through an interpreter, he said his daughter who weighed 110 pounds had come to America to study and "be a bridge between Japan and the United States."

He said "that dream went away and that burden should be on him (Crozier)."

The father also doubted Crozier's self-defense claim as he recounted the weekly phone calls he would receive from his daughter.

"She (Rie Shibuya) told me he (Crozier) would forcibly, almost strong arm her to be his girlfriend," Kiyosi Shibuya said. "He moved into her apartment and took money from her purse and used her credit cards and Rie wanted him to move out."

Kiyosi Shibuya said since his daughter's death his "wife hasn't gone out of the house and our relationship has gone sour as we don't even see each other anymore."

"I feel if he's released soon it certainly will affect our hearts and our lives," Kiyosi Shibuya said.