A Columbus teen who helped to set up a fake online advertisement that resulted in her 16-year-old boyfriend being shot and killed by police was sentenced Friday to spend three years in juvenile detention.

Masonique Saunders, 17, had entered admissions in Franklin County Juvenile Court in May to counts of involuntary manslaughter and aggravated robbery in relation to the shooting of her boyfriend, 16-year-old Julius Tate, by police on Dec. 7, 2018.

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She also admitted to an additional charge of aggravated robbery for a November 2018 incident in which a woman was pistol-whipped in front of her child.

At the time of her admissions, attorneys for the prosecution and her defense attorney, Jonathan Tyack, had said there was a recommendation for a three-year commitment to the Ohio Department of Youth Services.

On Friday, about 20 members of the Coalition to Free Masonique rallied outside the courthouse to protest Saunders' arrest and demand the police officer be held accountable for Tate's death.

Local activist Isaiah C. Boyd, 23, knows Saunders' parents and said he wanted people to be aware of the injustices in the community.

Protestors read poetry, spoke at an open microphone and condemned the sentencing and Saunders' plea to charges they believe she did not commit.

Some of the protestors chanted, "That ain't right," as five floors above them in the Franklin County Courthouse, Saunders was sentenced, with the option for release after two years depending on her behavior while in custody.

A woman, who did not want to be identified, approached the microphone and said "a child should not lose three years of her life in a cage."

Saunders has been in the Franklin County juvenile detention center since she was arrested six days after the Dec. 7 officer-involved shooting.

Tate had pulled a 9-mm handgun on an undercover Columbus Police officer who was working a sting operation on the 1300 block of Mount Vernon Avenue on the Near East Side. SWAT officer Eric Richard shot Tate after he pulled the handgun on the undercover officer.

Tate believed the officer to be a customer responding to a fake sales offer to obtain a cellphone for cash, an offer that Saunders had helped set up online.

Saunders was not armed or with Tate when the robbery took place, but she admitted to setting it up on her cellphone, as well as about 15 other, similar robberies. Saunders also shared the profits of the robberies with Tate.

Protestors have been outside the courthouse during every hearing Saunders has had and have held rallies, including one in the Short North in May that resulted in four people being arrested after blocking an intersection.

Richard's use of force in the shooting has not yet been ruled upon by a police review board. The case has not yet been presented to a grand jury either. Prosecutor Ron O'Brien's policy is to have all fatal police shootings heard by a grand jury.

bbruner@dispatch.com

@bethany_bruner

cdoyle@dispatch.com

@cadoyle_18