Deli Owner Sentenced to Life for Trying to Put Partner on Ice

A New Jersey deli owner convicted of paying a friend to kill his business partner has been sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Prosecutors say Raymond Troxell told friends he wanted Vincent Russo dead because the Staten Island, N.Y. man was taking money out of their business. They say he paid $3,000 for the killing.

But the 50-year-old South Brunswick man, who continued to maintain his innocence before being sentenced Friday, claims he was joking about having Russo killed and that the gunman was wrong to take him seriously.

Russo was found shot to death at the deli in North Brunswick in December 2008, about six months after it opened.

Troxell was convicted in May of soliciting the murder as an accomplice and paying for it to happen.