A man who murdered his wife on Christmas Eve and then forced their three young children to open their presents beside her lifeless body has been sentenced to 15 years to life in prison.
A Festive Dream Shattered by Brutal Violence
For 26-year-old Za'Zell Preston, Christmas Day 2011 was meant to be magical. It was her first festive season with her seven-week-old son, and she had prepared gifts and decorations for her three children, who also included her two daughters, aged three and eight, from a previous relationship.
However, her hopes for a perfect family day were a facade, masking years of abuse at the hands of her husband, William Wallace. Their three-year relationship was notoriously violent. Wallace, then 30, had a history of assaulting Za'Zell, serving a 45-day jail sentence in 2008 and violating a restraining order she had taken out against him.
Despite his promises to change and claims he had "found Jesus," the abuse continued. Za'Zell, who was weeks away from graduating as a domestic violence counsellor, was trapped in a cycle of violence she desperately wanted to escape.
The Christmas Eve Attack and a Grotesque Cover-Up
The nightmare unfolded after the couple returned from a neighbour's Christmas Eve gathering. An argument escalated into a brutal assault. Wallace repeatedly struck Za'Zell in the head. Her eldest daughter witnessed him shove her mother through a glass table, embedding shards in her skin.
When Za'Zell tried to flee, Wallace dragged her back inside. He later carried her to the bathroom and dropped her, causing her head to strike the toilet. The injuries proved fatal. Instead of calling emergency services, Wallace embarked on a horrifying charade.
On Christmas morning, he propped Za'Zell's body upright on the living room sofa, placing sunglasses over her eyes. He told the children, "Mommy got drunk and ruined Christmas," and instructed them to unwrap their gifts next to her corpse. He even filmed the children during this macabre scene.
A Long Road to Justice and a Life Sentence
Wallace initially claimed Za'Zell had fallen during a drunken struggle, but his history of violence undermined his defence. It took nine years for the case to come to trial. In 2021, a jury convicted him of second-degree murder.
During sentencing, Za'Zell's mother, Saidell Preston, who now cares for the three children, called Wallace a "selfish psychopath." "He beat and tortured my daughter and at the same time mentally assassinated her children," she told the court.
Za'Zell's eldest daughter, then 17, delivered a powerful victim impact statement. "I have grown up with a life of hell since he murdered my mom," she said. "There's no such thing as a childhood for me."
Wallace, now 39, was given a sentence of 15 years to life, with credit for the nine years he had already served since his arrest. The judge offered him no mercy for the Christmas crime that stole a mother and forever scarred her children.
