ELYRIA — Ronald McCloud Jr. has been sentenced to life without parole for the 2005 rape and murder of church worker Janet Barnard.

McCloud, 30, could have faced the death penalty.

Judge James Burge refused to order death. Judges Edward Zaleski and Raymond Ewers had wanted to impose the death penalty, but a unanimous decision was required for a death sentence.

McCloud made a rambling statement in which he blamed being “inflicted with the disease of being born to mentally torturous parents” for his actions. He said his subsequent lifestyle as a male escort put him in contact with “such wildity, many women over countless encounters, 300 to be exact.”

McCloud referred to “my father, Supreme Allah,” and said he wanted to “ask my father for forgiveness” for “the pain that I may have caused unknowing in the physical flesh.”

Barnard’s sister, Sharon Kaczmarczyk, told the court, “We accept your sentence of a more lenient sentence.”

Burge said his aunt had been raped and murdered in her home.

“Naturally, the family circled the wagons like Ms. Barnard’s did,” he said.

Prosecutors chose to seek life without parole for his aunt’s 19-year-old attacker, Burge said, and he asked Barnard’s family not to hate McCloud.

“When we hate, it’s like taking poison,” he said.

Kaczmarczyk said, “He needs to serve his punishment.”

Burge replied, “I agree, 100 percent.”

Read Wednesday’s Chronicle for more on this story.