Two days after a Clackamas County jury found him responsible for the death of an acquaintance, Francis Weaver stood before the man's mother Friday and told her his death was never meant to happen.

As tears streamed down his face and onto his black-and-white jail uniform, Weaver described Edward Kelly Spangler as a good man.

"I pray for you guys every day," Weaver told Alice Spangler. "I prayed for his children every day for over 25 months while I was at the Clackamas County Jail."

Weaver said that even at his own expense, he did what he could to ensure "everyone involved didn't walk away from what happened" to Edward Spangler.

The judge then ordered Weaver, 33, to serve life in prison with the possibility of parole after 25 years for providing the gun used to kill Spangler, 43, in February 2014.

Weaver was one of four people arrested in the killing in Canby. A jury found him guilty of murder, first- and second-degree robbery, conspiracy to commit first- and second-degree robbery and felon in possession of a firearm.

Weaver is the stepson of one of Clackamas County's most notorious convicted killers. His stepfather, Ward Weaver III, is serving a life sentence for raping and killing two Oregon City girls in 2002. His step-grandfather, Ward Weaver Jr., was sentenced to death for killing a stranded motorist in California in 1981 and then raping, killing and burying the motorist's fiancee.

Prosecutors said Francis Weaver lured Spangler from his home in Grants Pass to Canby two years ago under the pretense that he would help him sell marijuana, but Weaver actually planned to rob the Grants Pass man.

Weaver enlisted the help of his next-door neighbor, Michael Orren, and longtime friend Shannon Bettencourt to break out Spangler's SUV window when it was empty and swipe a suitcase with 15 pounds of marijuana inside. Weaver also provided the gun later used in the killing.

Orren and Bettencourt failed to break out the window and steal the marijuana after four attempts in Canby and Clackamas. While Spangler was parked in his SUV at the Canby apartment complex where Orren and Weaver lived, Orren shot him twice. Spangler hit several vehicles in the lot while trying to escape, crashed into a park across the street and later died.

Weaver and his attorney claimed during the trial that although he picked up the pistol earlier that morning from a friend's apartment, he didn't give the gun to Orren and told his two friends not to engage in any violence. Weaver also testified that Spangler was in on the plan, which he described as an attempt to rip off Spangler's drug supplier. Weaver claimed that the two other men involved didn't know the break-in and theft were supposed to be staged.

Bettencourt, 34, and Orren's ex-wife, Brittany Endicott, 26, were convicted of first-degree robbery in connection with the scheme. Both received 71/2-year sentences and testified against Weaver as part of their plea agreements.

Orren, 29, pleaded guilty to aggravated murder and first-degree robbery. He is serving a 71/2-year prison term for the robbery and will be sentenced for aggravated murder on April 5. He is scheduled to receive a life sentence and serve a minimum of 30 years before he'll be eligible for parole.

Jack Bernstein, Weaver's attorney, told Clackamas County Circuit Judge Michael Wetzel that his client maintained his innocence after he was found guilty. Weaver's mother, Maria Weaver, angrily stormed out of the courtroom in tears soon after the proceedings began and yelled, "I know he didn't do it."

"There is no justice," Maria Weaver said in a courthouse hallway after the sentencing. "He didn't pull the trigger. He didn't know they were going to do this and now he has to pay?"

Rusty Amos, the Clackamas County deputy district attorney who prosecuted the case, read several letters from Spangler's family that expressed grief over his loss, anger at the actions of others that led to his killing and disappointment over his choice to sell marijuana.

Spangler left behind four children and a granddaughter, Alice Spangler wrote, and was killed on his stepson's birthday. She said her grief at losing her only son has affected her health.

"The past two years have been a living hell," Amos read from the mother's letter. "I ask myself 'Will it ever get better?' I have nightmares almost every night."

Alice Spangler wrote that her family's lives will never be the same, but she believes "justice, in this case, has been served."

Hope Gibbs, Spangler's adopted sister, wrote that she still misses the man who was her father figure, bought her first bike and taught her to ride it, and made a point to keep in touch with her.

"I don't know if I can ever forgive him for putting himself in the position he did," she wrote. "The only positive thing I have to take out of this situation is a real-life example of what drugs can do to people for my three children to learn from."

-- Everton Bailey Jr.

ebailey@oregonian.com

503-221-8343; @EvertonBailey