SAN JOSE, Calif. — Former UFC champion Cain Velasquez was sentenced Monday afternoon to 5 years in prison after his no-contest plea last year to attempted murder and other crimes for a violent 2022 car chase in which he repeatedly shot at a man accused of molesting his young son but wounded the man’s stepfather instead.

The sentence was issued by Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Arthur Bocanegra in a San Jose courtroom, capping an explosive case spanning the past three years during which Velasquez’s outward portrayal morphed from that of a quiet, but unabashed, vigilante to a contrite defendant seeking court leniency, culminating in reserved acceptance of his legal fate.

Velasquez, who had been free on $1 million bail and supervised release since his charges were approved for trial in late 2022 following a preliminary examination, was taken into custody by court bailiffs at the end of Monday’s hearing. He will receive credit on his sentence for time already served.

There was a wide chasm between the sentences sought by Deputy District Attorney Aaron French, who asked for a 30 years-to-life prison term, while Velasquez’s attorney Renee Hessling requested that the judge dismiss a gun-based charging enhancement and grant her client probation.

In a nearly three-hour court session Monday morning, Paul Bender — who was shot twice and wounded during the Feb. 28, 2022 episode — gave a victim statement to Bocanegra alongside his wife Patty Bender, who was with her son Harry Goularte in the vehicle when Velasquez rammed and opened fire on them near Monterey Road and Bailey Avenue.

The courtroom was packed with supporters of both Velasquez and the Bender family, to the point where people were allowed to stand in the foyer to the courtroom, and dozens of others were made to wait outside because capacity had been reached.

What had not been heard publicly until the sentencing hearing was a 911 call recording in which Patty Bender narrates the 11-mile high-speed chase in real-time to an emergency dispatcher, describing the first shooting at Goularte and then how after Velasquez shot at them the second time, they continued to flee in desperate search for a responding police officer and ambulance.

“He’s shooting! He’s shooting at us! Hurry!” Patty Bender said after the first gunshots in the middle of a busy Morgan Hill thoroughfare.

That was followed a few minutes later near the second shooting site — close to a charter school letting out for the day — with Patty Bender telling the dispatcher, “We’re going 100 miles an hour. Is anybody coming?” followed soon after by, “Paul’s bleeding everywhere!”

Paul Bender described how he continues to have severely limited use of his right arm and suffers from post-traumatic stress, and urged the judge to not only punish Velasquez for his violence, but for his subversion of the criminal justice system.

“Cain Velasquez demonstrated that he has no respect for the judicial system, does not care about the rule of law, and has no regard for human life,” Paul Bender said in court Monday. “(My family) will never be the same because of Cain Velasquez’s actions.”

Velasquez was conciliatory in his own statement to the court and said that he would agree with whatever sentence Bocanegra gave him.

“My actions were reckless and extremely dangerous. I’m ashamed and regretful for how I handled myself on the day of my crime,” he said. “Out of all this, I wish safe healing for my family, and to the Goulartes, I wish safe healing, and to the community, I wish safe healing.”

In August, Velasquez pleaded no contest to attempted murder and nine gun assault crimes in the 2022 attack after reaching a plea agreement that removed premeditation from the charged allegations, meaning that a life prison sentence would no longer be mandatory. That set the stage for French to push for a life sentence regardless, while Hessling asked the judge to consider a “heat of passion” argument that the plea terms also legally took out of play.

French argued to Bocanegra that the danger Velasquez posed to countless bystanders, and his decision to press forward over the course of 11 miles by chasing the the victims at high speed and shooting at them from a moving vehicle, could not be taken lightly by the court.

“He decided to take the law into his own hands and impose a death sentence in broad daylight in our community,” French said. “He disregarded everyone and everything in his way.”

Hessling pleaded with Bocanegra to consider Velasquez’s absence of any legal violations before and after the shooting, arguing that prison would be unnecessary to ensure that Velasquez is not a threat to the community, or to evoke the contrition he has already expressed publicly. She also described Velasquez’s mental state at the time of the shooting, which revolved around his feelings of failure to protect his child against the alleged abuse.

“The weight of that, the gravity of that, the pain in that, is difficult to quantify,” Hessling said. “Heat of passion is exactly what that was.”

“Mr. Velasquez has demonstrated clearly that he can follow the law,” Hessling added later in her remarks. “He did it every day before Feb. 28, 2022 and every day after it.”

Velasquez’s sentencing was delayed from January after Hessling balked at the sentence proposed by prosecutors, which was significantly longer than the roughly eight-year sentence she said was recommended by the county Probation Department. She filed a Racial Justice Act motion, alleging bias in the sentencing methodology, which was denied by Bocanegra.

On the afternoon of the attack, Goularte was with his stepfather and mother when they all drove from Morgan Hill to San Jose so Goularte could get fitted for an ankle monitor in accordance with his pretrial supervision by the county. A few days earlier, he had been arraigned on one felony charge of a lewd and lascivious act with a child, identified later as Velasquez’s then-4-year-old son.

Shortly after Goularte got into his parents’ pickup truck in Morgan Hill, authorities say Velasquez fired his first shot at Goularte, touching off the chase through Morgan Hill that ended on the southern edge of San Jose. Velasquez eventually fired several shots at the three with a .40-caliber pistol, wounding Bender in the arm and torso, then continued to chase and shoot at the victims before he was intercepted by Morgan Hill police and surrendered.

Investigators later determined that Velasquez had begun following Goularte’s parents as they left their San Martin residence.

Goularte — who has been ordered to stand trial — and his family have staunchly denied the accusations against him. His parents told this news organization earlier this year that sheriff’s office investigators declined to review what they say is exonerating evidence, including a corroborated alibi and video surveillance showing Goularte was not on the premises of the family’s home daycare at the time the sexual abuse allegations were reported to have occurred.

In court, Goularte’s attorney has repeatedly argued that the charges are predicated on the testimony and memory of a young child whose recollection given during a preliminary examination was inconsistent and did not align with longstanding practices at the daycare. The attorney has also pointed out that no other allegations against Goularte have surfaced, despite insinuations made by detectives early on in the investigation.

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