Former US intel director's daughter sentenced to 35 years for murder

FILE - This photo provided by the Montgomery County Police Dept. shows Sophia Negroponte. (Montgomery County Police Dept. via AP, File)

ROCKVILLE, Md. (AP) — The daughter of former U.S. intelligence director John Negroponte was sentenced to 35 years in prison on Friday for the fatal stabbing of a friend after a drunken argument at a Maryland home.

Sophia Negroponte, 33, was sentenced by Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge Terrence McGann. A jury found her guilty in November of second-degree murder for the death of 24-year-old Yousuf Rasmussen. It was a retrial after a 2023 conviction on the same charge was overturned.

“The 35-year sentence mirrors the sentence imposed following the first trial in 2023. This is an appropriate and just outcome in light of the seriousness of this crime and the consistent findings of two separate juries who carefully evaluated the evidence,” said Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy.

The initial conviction was overturned in 2024 after an appeals court ruled the jury had been allowed to hear contested portions of a police interrogation of Sophia Negroponte and testimony from a prosecution witness questioning her credibility.

Sophia Negroponte, of Washington, D.C., was one of five abandoned or orphaned Honduran children adopted by John Negroponte and his wife after he was appointed as U.S. ambassador to the Central American country in the 1980s, according to The Washington Post.

Former President George W. Bush appointed John Negroponte as the nation’s first intelligence director in 2005. He later served as deputy secretary of state. He also served as ambassador to Mexico, the Philippines, the United Nations and Iraq.