Natrona Heights woman tries to retract manslaughter plea at sentencing

Brook Lynn Lank pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter on June 11 — admitting she shot her boyfriend three times before dumping his body in a McKees Rocks alley.

In preparation for sentencing, she wrote a letter to the court acknowledging what she called her mistakes, and saying, “I take full accountability for them.”

On Tuesday, after the judge sentenced her to serve five to 10 years — ignoring her request for electronic home monitoring and immediate parole — Lank tried to take it back.

“I am not guilty of killing anybody,” she said, pleading with the judge as sheriff’s deputies handcuffed her. “I did not kill anybody.”

Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Kelly E. Bigley, who had already imposed the sentence, told Lank she would appoint a public defender to file an appeal.

Lank, 28, of Natrona Heights, pleaded guilty to shooting Anthony Lofton, 22, in the early morning of March 13, 2022.

Assistant District Attorney Matthew DiGiacomo told the judge that Lank and Lofton had a fight several hours earlier in which Lofton pushed her to the ground and pointed two guns at her — all of which was captured on video in the home.

They remained together in her North Side residence for a few more hours, and around 5 a.m. left together in a rented Ford Taurus.

Lank told police that as they drove, they began to argue again, and she took the gun off Lofton and shot him three times.

She then picked up another man, and the two of them dumped Lofton’s body in Derby Alley in McKees Rocks. They then took the car to Econo Lodge on Steubenville Pike in Kennedy to clean it.

That’s where police tracked them down, using the vehicle’s rental agreement, GPS locator and surveillance cameras.

Treated ‘like garbage’

In an interview with investigators, Lank said after she shot Lofton the first time, he was still breathing and reaching for her so she shot him twice more.

The victim’s sister, Simone McMeans, said her brother didn’t deserve to die the way he did.

“I know where the bullets hit him,” she said. “She had every opportunity to get away.

”There was an intention to murder — murder,” McMeans said, her voice rising. “She left him in the street like garbage.”

McMeans said her brother had twin daughters who will never get to know him.

“We can’t do anything to bring him back, but we can fight for justice for him,” she said.

Lofton’s father, Anthony Lofton, expressed frustration during his victim impact statement that Lank was released on bond while her case was pending.

Although she spent about 17 months in the Allegheny County Jail, Lank was released in August 2023 and remained on electronic home monitoring until Tuesday.

“This young lady killed my son with no remorse or nothing,” Lofton said. “She blew my son’s brains out on the street like a dog. There’s no justice.”

Broken but healing

Defense attorney Nina Martinelli told the court that her client is remorseful.

“She lives with this every day,” the attorney said.

Although Lank did not want to speak in open court, she wrote a letter to the judge.

In it, she told the court that she has been sober for three years and is working to better herself and the lives of her children.

“Recovery didn’t just help me get off drugs — it helped me find myself,” she wrote. “I’ve done the inner work: therapy, support groups, parenting programs and the hard emotional healing that comes from facing your past head-on.”

Lank, who said she had a traumatic, unstable childhood, wrote that she now knows her worth and that she has broken away from the cycle of abuse.

“I know I can’t change what brought me here, but I hope you’ll see the changes I have made,” Lank wrote to the judge. “I’m not asking for anything more than a fair chance to continue proving that I’m more than the worst moments of my life.

“I’m asking to be seen as someone who’s been broken, but who chose to heal — and is still healing every single day.”