A woman has learned her fate for shooting and killing a teenager she believed had tried to break into her sister’s vehicle.

Zariah Johnson, 23, was sentenced on Thursday to 32 years in prison plus 15 years of extended supervision in the death of 14-year-old Alijah Golden-Richmond last year, according to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, news outlets, including Fox affiliate WITI. Johnson had pleaded guilty in July to first-degree reckless homicide.

The fatal shooting occurred on Aug. 15, 2024, in the area of 39th and Vliet streets in Milwaukee. According to a criminal complaint reviewed by Law&Crime, Johnson was at home with her family when she learned her sister’s car was being broken into. When she looked outside, she saw four people near her car and “armed herself with her mother’s black handgun.”

A witness with the victim said Golden-Richmond “wanted to steal a car,” and as they were moving around the neighborhood, they spotted the blue-green Hyundai that belonged to Johnson’s sister. However, after the victim reportedly broke the car window, they heard a voice from inside a nearby building exclaim “mmhmmm,” according to WITI, and they ran.

Their departure wasn’t enough to ensure their safety, according to the complaint, as Johnson sought to go after them. Still armed with the gun, she got in her sister’s vehicle and drove after the fleeing individuals.

The same witness said they saw the car coming after them from an alley, so they “hid on the front porch of a house and the car stopped.” After Johnson fired in the air, they took off running, and she “started shooting in their direction and hit dirt by his feet,” the complaint adds. None of them were armed, the witness said.

Johnson would later tell police that she had no intent to do anyone physical harm; she merely wanted to “scare” them.

But she had done physical harm.

Once detectives arrived at the scene, they realized citizens thought the victim was overdosing and thus gave him two doses of Narcan. In reality, he had been shot in the back, with the bullet going through his liver, heart, and entering his chest cavity. He was dead, and five bullet casings were found in the area.

Johnson initially deflected the blame, saying a man named “Neff” was the shooter. But when she learned someone close to her pegged her for the crime, she changed her tune.

“After [Johnson] was advised that a witness said the shooter was a female and that her own mother had said she was the shooter, [Johnson] began to cry and said she did not intend to kill anyone,” police said. She then “admitted she was the shooter.”

The 23-year-old woman said when she drove near the four individuals, “she was not sure if they were the ones who broke into her car.” She circled the block and returned, yelling something at them to get their attention, she told police.

This caused two of them to run – ostensibly the witness and Golden-Richmond – and then Johnson opened fire “until her gun jammed.” She told police “she did not observe actually hitting anyone,” saying the two individuals continued to run.

But Johnson would soon get an indication that she was in trouble. When she returned home, she “located a Facebook Live stream with the person she shot. The person recording was saying that the person was overdosing, but then it was discovered that he was shot in the back and was dead,” the complaint states.

“She then realized that this was in the area she had fired shots and that she likely is the person who killed him,” it goes on. “She then told her mother and left the area with a gun.”

While Johnson reportedly told police where she disposed of the gun, when they searched the spot, they did not find it. Her mother – who told police she rode shotgun when her daughter went on the hunt for the individuals – said Johnson told her she had thrown her gun down a sewer.