Slayer Is Given Long Prison Term

Slayer Is Given Long Prison Term Killed Victim in Fight at Christening Party in Camden Pleading non vult to a charge of causing the death of Peter Lukasiewicz at a christening party in Camden on August 22 of last year, Michael Czulak was yesterday sentenced by Justice Katzenbach in Camden to spend from ten to thirty years at hard labor in the State Prison. The slain man was 38 years old and lived at 3159 Edgemont street. Czulak was 38 years old and resided at 414 Viola street. The killing occurred at 1911 Filmore street during a free-for-all fight in which shots were fired and knives drawn. When the excitement subsided Lukasiewicz was dead on the floor and Czulak was standing over him with a bloody knife in his hand. Counsel for the prisoner contended that Czulak merely used the knife to defend himself and that he was never certain that he had struck the fatal blow. "I feel sure that a verdict of murder in the second degree would have been rendered had this case been tried by a jury," said Justice Katzenbach. "Drunkenness is no excuse for a crime, but it sometimes has an important bearing in the matter of sentence. I am treating this issue in the sense of manslaughter."