MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A Wisconsin man accused of killing his parents and stealing their money to fund a plan to assassinate President Donald Trump pleaded guilty to two homicide counts in a deal with prosecutors Thursday, locking himself into two life prison sentences.
Nikita Casap, 18, pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree intentional homicide in Waukesha County Circuit Court in connection with the deaths of his stepfather, Donald Mayer, and his mother, Tatiana Casap, last year. In exchange, prosecutors dropped seven other charges, including two counts of hiding a corpse and theft.
Each homicide count carries a mandatory life prison sentence. Judge Ralph Ramirez could choose to make Casap eligible for parole after he serves 20 years on each count when he is sentenced on March 5.
Casap trembled in his seat at the defense table as Ramirez asked him if he understood the ramifications of his pleas and whether he shot his mother and Mayer. He responded “Yes, your honor" to everything.
Casap's attorney, public defender Joseph Rifelj, spoke only to confirm the terms of the plea agreement with Ramirez and to say that he had sufficient time to speak with Casap about it. Rifelj left the hearing without speaking to reporters.
District Attorney Lesli Boese told reporters outside court that her goal was to force Casap to accept responsibility for his parents' deaths and two mandatory life sentences amount to sufficient punishment.
She said she will push Ramirez to deny Casap any chance at parole. She said Casap is a “danger to the community and that she didn't want to take any chances that he could be rehabilitated.
According to a criminal complaint, investigators believe Casap shot his stepfather and mother at their home in the village of Waukesha on or around Feb. 11.
He lived with the decomposing bodies for weeks before fleeing across the country in his stepfather's SUV with $14,000 in cash, jewelry, passports, his stepfather's gun and the family dog, according to the complaint. He was eventually arrested during a traffic stop in Kansas on Feb. 28.
Federal authorities have accused Casap of planning his parents' murders, buying a drone and explosives and sharing his plans with others, including a Russian speaker. They said in a federal search warrant that he wrote a manifesto calling for Trump's assassination and was in touch with others about his plan to kill Trump and overthrow the U.S. government.
“The killing of his parents appeared to be an effort to obtain the financial means and autonomy necessary to carrying out his plan,” that warrant said.
Detectives found several messages on Casap's cellphone from January 2025 in which Casap asks how long he will have to hide before he is moved to Ukraine. An unknown individual responded in Russian, the complaint said, but the document doesn't say what that person told Casap. In another message Casap asks: “So while in Ukraine, I'll be able to live a normal life? Even if it's found out I did it?”
FILE - Nikita Casap appears at his arraignment May 7, 2025 in Waukesha County Circuit Court in Waukesha, Wis. (Mark Hoffman/Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel via AP, Pool, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Thursday that he will allow service members to carry personal weapons onto military installations, citing the Second Amendment and recent shootings at bases across the country.
In a video posted to X, Hegseth said he is signing a memo that will direct base commanders to allow requests for troops to carry privately owned firearms “with the presumption that it is necessary for personal protection.”
He said any denial of a service member's request must be explained in detail and in writing.
“Effectively, our bases across the country were gun-free zones,” Hegseth said. “Unless you're training or unless you are a military policeman, you couldn't carry, you couldn't bring your own firearm for your own personal protection onto post.”
Questions about why service members lacked access to weapons have often emerged following shootings on the nation's military bases. Such shootings have ranged from isolated events between service members to mass casualty events, such as the shootings by an Army psychiatrist at Texas’ Ford Hood in 2009 that left 13 people dead.
Hegseth cited some of the events in his video, including a shooting that injured five soldiers at Fort Stewart in Georgia last year. Officials said the shooter, an Army sergeant who worked at the base, used his personal handgun before he was tackled by fellow soldiers and arrested.
“In these instances, minutes are a lifetime,” Hegseth said. “And our service members have the courage and training to make those precious, short minutes count.”
Defense Department policy has prohibited military personnel from carrying personal weapons on base without permission from a senior commander, with strict protocol for how the firearms must be stored.
Typically, military personnel must officially check their guns out of secure storage to go to on-base hunting areas or shooting ranges, then check all firearms back in promptly after their sanctioned use. Military police are often the only armed personnel on base, outside of shooting ranges, hunting areas or in training, where soldiers can wield their service weapons without ammunition.
Tanya Schardt, senior counsel at the Brady gun violence prevention organization, said in a statement that Defense Department leaders and the military’s top brass have opposed relaxing the current policy, which was originally enacted under President George H.W. Bush.
Schardt noted that most active duty service members who die by suicide do so with a weapon they own personally, not one military-issued, and argued that there will “undoubtedly be an increase in gun suicide and other gun violence.”
While fewer American service members died by suicide in 2024, the suicide rates among active duty troops overall still have gradually increased between 2011 and 2024, according to a Pentagon report released Tuesday.
“Our military installations are among the most guarded, protected properties in the world, and they’ve never been ‘gun-free zones,’” Schardt said. “If there is a problem with violent crime on these installations, then the Secretary of Defense has an obligation to alert the American people and describe how he’s working to prevent that crime.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth speaks to members of the media during a press briefing at the Pentagon in Washington, Tuesday, March 31, 2026. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)
