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Man involved in 4-state crime spree starting in Colorado sentenced to 33 years in prison

Matthew Fanelli is suspected of killing Uber driver David Rosenthal in Denver in 2019.

JOSEPHINE COUNTY, Ore. — A man believed to have begun a four-state crime spree in Colorado in 2019, was sentenced to spend decades in an Oregon prison.

According to southern Oregon NBC affiliate KOBI, Matthew Fanelli was sentenced to 33 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to multiple counts of attempted murder.

Fanelli allegedly began his crime spree in Colorado Springs just after midnight on Friday, Feb. 22, 2019 according to the El Paso County Sheriff's Office. The sheriff's office said Fanelli became upset when he was asked to leave Deja VU Showgirls in Colorado Springs and began shooting at the manager and two bouncers when he left. Nobody was hurt. Fanelli left the club with a man, as well as a naked female employee he had assaulted, deputies said.  

>Video above is from 2019: Friends remember David Rosenthal.

A couple of hours later, Fanelli is believed to have shot and killed 58-year-old David Rosenthal near Colfax Avenue and Perry Street, according to Denver Police. Rosenthal was working as a rideshare driver when he was killed. Police said Fanelli and two others, Jose Lopez-Jovel and Cynthia Sena, took Rosenthal's car after shooting him.

Later in the morning of Feb. 22, Fanelli, Lopez and Sena allegedly robbed a convenience store in Cheyenne, Wyoming, authorities said. The trio then drove to Park City, Utah, where they robbed a bank, Oregon State Police said in 2019.

An Oregon State Police (OSP) release from 2019 said they were called to a Red Robin restaurant in Roseburg on Feb. 23 on a report of an attempted carjacking. One of the suspects, later identified as Fanelli, had driven off before officers arrived, while the other, Lopez-Jovel, was left behind and arrested, according to OSP. 

During a pursuit down Interstate 5, Fanelli fired at an OSP patrol car and two other vehicles, and critically injured a man while attempting another carjacking, police said in a release. Fanelli was later arrested. OSP said one of the bullets Fanelli fired struck an occupied car seat, but luckily the child was not injured.  

Fanelli is scheduled for an extradition hearing in Oregon on April 12. Lopez-Jovel and Sena are being held in federal custody awaiting trial for the Utah bank robbery, according to federal court records.

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