From the District Attorney’s Office:

ANCHORAGE – An Anchorage man was sentenced on Friday by U.S. District Judge Joshua M. Kindred to seven years in federal prison for carjacking a vehicle with a minor inside it.

According to court documents, Maquire Malo Levi, 24, spotted a running vehicle in the Dimond Center parking lot in November 2019. Levi got into the driver’s seat of the car and began to drive away. A 16-year-old-boy in the back seat of the vehicle punched the defendant at which point Levi elbowed the boy in the face. The boy then opened the back door and jumped out of the moving vehicle as Levi sped off. He later abandoned the car, and his DNA was found on the steering wheel and shifter. Levi was indicted on federal carjacking charges in January 2021.

“Levi’s callous, reckless, and dangerous actions certainly merit this significant sentence,” said U.S. Attorney John E. Kuhn, Jr. of the District of Alaska. “This prosecution and sentence will make Alaska safer and should deter future similar conduct.”

“This individual’s complete disregard for public safety and senseless violence committed against innocent bystanders, is patently unacceptable,” said Special Agent in Charge Antony Jung of the FBI Anchorage Field Office. “The FBI and our partners will continue working in lockstep to get dangerous individuals like this off our streets and hold them accountable for their crimes.”

The FBI and the Anchorage Police Department investigated the case.

 Assistant U.S. Attorney Jennifer Ivers and Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Kayla Doyle prosecuted the case.