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A former U.S. soldier who fought in Ukraine was sentenced to two life terms for killing a Florida couple during a robbery intended to fund his travel to Venezuela to fight the government of Nicolás Maduro, the Justice Department said Tuesday.
Craig Austin Lang, 35, was convicted in September on federal charges, including robbery and conspiring to kill persons in a foreign country. He was previously extradited from Ukraine, where he had volunteered to fight against Russian separatists.
“Lang’s alleged conduct is shocking in its scope and its callous disregard for human life,” Nicole Argentieri, principal deputy assistant attorney general of the Department of Justice’s criminal division, previously said in a statement.
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Craig Austin Lang, an ex-US soldier, was extradited from Ukraine to the U.S. to face multiple federal indictments, including murder, dating back to 2019. (East2West)
Lang and another former soldier, Alex Jared Zwiefelhofer, killed Serafin “Danny” Lorenzo Jr. and Deana Lorenzo, who traveled from Brooksville to Estero, in April 2018 during what the couple believed was a meeting to buy guns advertised on “Armslist,” an online marketplace, federal prosecutors said.
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Craig Austin Lang, left, an ex-US soldier, is accused of killing Deana Lorenzo, right, and her husband in a double homicide in 2019 before he allegedly fled the country to fight as a mercenary in foreign countries. (Special to The News-Press)
The pair had brought $3,000 and were ambushed in a parking lot and shot multiple times, authorities said. The robbery was intended to fund travel plans for Lang and Zwiefelhofer to Venezuela, where they hoped to join a paramilitary group.
Lang was dishonorably discharged from the U.S. Army in 2014 before joining the far-right Ukrainian nationalist military group known as Right Sector two years later, according to The Washington Post.
Craig Austin Lang, an ex-U.S. soldier, faces three federal indictments in three states dating back to 2019 after fighting extradition from Ukraine for years, the Department of Justice said. (East2West)
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Lang and Zwiefelhofer had previously fought in Ukraine and intended to travel to fight in other conflicts.
Zwiefelhofer was convicted in 2024 and sentenced to two consecutive life terms in prison.