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NIXZMARY KILLER GETS 29 YEARS IN PRISON

“I loved Nixzmary.”

That was the pitiful, last ditch effort Cesar Rodriguez offered up to a Brooklyn judge in hopes of getting anything but the maximum prison term for beating his 7-year-old step-daughter to death.

“I can honestly say that I’m being accused for something I didn’t do” Rodriguez said. “But I take responsibility, as I said. I’m not mad at anybody. I’ll do my sentence.”

An unmoved Justice Priscilla Hall decided the max would suffice and gave him up to 29 years behind bars – 25 years for manslaughter and another 1 1/3 to 4 years for unlawful imprisonment for tying the little girl to a chair, caging her and eventually causing her death.

“If at the end, God gives me enough life just to show to this court how wrongly they made the judgment, I wish to prove that someday.”

As officers escorted Rodriguez, 29, from the courtroom, applause and cries of “murderer” rang out from the gallery, prompting Hall to loudly rebuke the audience, “No! I repeat, No!”

Rodriguez was convicted last month of manslaughter, but acquitted of murder, for causing the girl’s death on Jan. 11, 2006.

Prosecutors said Rodriguez, acting together with the girl’s mother, Nixzaliz Santiago, regularly beat, tied, and starved the girl, even forcing her to use a cat litter box as a toilet. Five jurors who sat on the 10-week trial returned for the sentencing and applauded the judge’s decision.

“Great,” said panel member Janice Richardson. “I wish it could have been more. I don’t know what to tell you.”

Chief prosecutor Ama Dwimoh, in asking for the maximum, said Nixzmary’s older brother, Javier Batista, still lived in fear of Rodriguez.

“When asked, he said that he’s not happy with what Cesar did to his sister,” said Dwimoh, “but he hopes and prays when Cesar gets out of jail, he’s too frail and weak, so he can’t hurt any other children again.”