Twins sentenced to 12 years in prison for beating, killing Good Samaritan

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- With their lawyers by their sides, twin brothers Gerald and Jared Smith stood together in court Wednesday. Both in jail jumpsuits for the death of 49-year-old Nathan Halsted.

Back in 2014, Halsted was seen on surveillance cameras rolling up on his bike and stopping the then 19-year-old brothers from attacking a female prostitute near Belmont and Calaveras in the Tower District.

But in return, the brothers turned on Halsten beating him up and leaving the good Samaritan in the middle of the road.

He died minutes later after a car ran him over.

Chief Jerry Dyer says it is not the driver's fault, "He did not. The people who are responsible for this are Gerald and Jared Smith who were the ones that beat this victim and allowed him to be run over and killed," said Chief Dyer.

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Now both men are being sentenced for that crime. A judge sentenced them to prison for 12 years.

A decision their mom thinks should have not been made.

"They were not murderers," Lou Ann Smith says she knows that to be true because she was home the morning of the attack when her sons walked through the front door.

"They had their tennis shoes on they had white t-shirts on, their white t-shirts had no blood, they had no blood or anything," Smith said.

But evidence has shown otherwise, specifically, fingerprints from a vehicle belonging to a man who investigators say the suspects also tried to fight.

Those facts are the reason both men pleaded "no contest" to voluntary manslaughter last December.

Though it is not the outcome Mrs. Smith would have liked to see, she does understand this, "They said mom we were in the wrong place at the wrong time."

And because of time served, the earliest Gerald and Jared can get out is 2026.

By then, they will be close to 30-years-old.