A Florida woman who tried to cover up a fatal stabbing by pouring Mountain Dew all over herself has been sentenced to 35 years behind bars.
Nichole Maks, 37, fatally stabbed her 79-year-old roommate Michael Cerasoli inside their Daytona Beach home on July 12, 2023.
Maks then set fire to the second floor of the house and fled, with first responders racing to the scene after a passerby spotted smoke coming from the home.
Cerasoli’s body was found on the second floor with blunt force trauma injuries to the head and stab wounds to his chest. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Maks was located a short time later at an intersection, armed with a knife and hammer – which police say she promptly dropped as officers approached.
Maks was not wearing any shoes at the time, and police noticed blood on her leg and saw that she was bleeding from her toe.
Part of Maks’ shirt also appeared to have been cut or torn off, which investigators later determined also had blood on it.
On Thursday, Maks was sentenced to 35 years in a state correctional facility for the killing of Cerasoli, according to Law&Crime.
When police questioned Maks, they claimed she changed her story about where she was living – saying she had been homeless for about four years.
She also reportedly told cops she was hospitalized earlier in the day after she had a panic attack at a gym where she was running on a treadmill.
Maks denied seeing Cerasoli that day, but police say she later changed her story to say she did, in fact, see him.
She eventually refused to answer any more questions and asked for an attorney.
Officers then informed her that they were going to take DNA samples, at which point she requested a soda.
Kind cops then handed her a can of Diet Mountain Dew.
But officers soon noticed she was taking her time with the drink, which they tried to grab from her.
At that point, Maks poured the drink over her head and hair in what police called an attempt to interfere with the collection of evidence.
Her efforts, though, failed as investigators were able to determine that both her and Cerasoli’s blood matched that on the knife found next to his body.
In the aftermath, an attorney representing Maks tried to claim she was unfit to stand trial – but mental health professionals found her competent to stand trial last December.
By November, Maks reached a plea agreement in which she pleaded no contest to a reduced charge of second-degree murder as opposed to a first-degree murder charge, which carries a mandatory life sentence.
She also pleaded no contest to arson of a dwelling – a first degree felony, and evidence tampering and resisting arrest with violence, both third-degree felonies.
The 35 years in prison is the least amount of prison time she could receive, according to her plea agreement.
Public Defender Jessica Lindsey Roberts told the court that Maks had been the victim of sexual abuse and sex trafficking throughout her life, according to the Daytona Beach News-Journal.
Her representative said that many people had betrayed her, and then her own mind betrayed her which led to the killing.
Circuit Judge Leah Case cited the abuse when sentencing her, adding: ‘We can’t lose sight of the fact that she murdered somebody.’
She had been diagnosed as having both a schizoaffective disorder bipolar type and post-traumatic stress disorder.