Sarah Crawford's family is not about to let her memory fade away.

“My daughter was awesome,” said mother Jennifer Baysinger.

“She was on the road to success,” said grandmother Lyn Mazinski.

“She had a tumultuous life but she had a good heart. She was getting her life together,” said aunt Tami Sudy.

Sarah, a mother of four, was just 30 when she died, gunned down by her newlywed husband Dec. 4, 2016, at the couple's home on East Slippery Rock Road in Donegal Township.

Her family spoke out Thursday, outside Butler County Judge William Shaffer's courtroom.

Moments earlier in the packed courtroom, Shaffer sentenced 31-year-old Joshua P. Crawford to 10 to 23 years in state prison. He was given credit for already serving 592 days in Butler County Prison.

The prison term imposed at Crawford's sentencing hearing was in keeping with a plea agreement previously reached between his public defender and prosecutors.

Last month he pleaded guilty to third-degree murder in his wife's slaying.

According to court records and previous court testimony, the couple — married just three months — was arguing when Crawford grabbed an already loaded magazine, placed it in his .30-06 hunting rifle and attempted to shoot himself.

When the gun did not fire, Sarah allegedly called the defendant names and encouraged him to shoot himself, police said. The suspect then allegedly turned the rifle on his wife.

She died of a single gunshot wound to the chest.

In earlier pretrial court filings, Crawford's attorney, public defender Joseph Smith, suggested his client was suffering from a mental infirmity that night, and hinted of a possible insanity defense.

Prosecutors originally charged Crawford with a general count of homicide, which encompasses first-, second- and third-degree murder, as well as voluntary and involuntary manslaughter.

Under state law, third-degree murder involves an indifference to one's own actions potentially causing another's death. It carries a maximum penalty of 40 years in prison.

Crawford at Thursday's sentencing hearing expressed remorse and offered an apology to Sarah's family.

“My actions that night are unacceptable,” he said, standing before Shaffer in orange prison garb. “I still love Sarah and I live through what I did, every night.”

Before Shaffer handed down the sentence, Baysinger, Sarah's mother, delivered a brief victim impact statement from a wheelchair.

“There's not too much I can say,” she said. “I can't explain. There are no words. The depression (is) so bad. I wasn't able to heal from surgery.”

Relatives said Baysinger has been using a wheelchair since suffering complications from hip replacement surgery in July 2017.

Outside the courtroom, Sarah's family took no solace in Crawford's sentence.

“It's not really fair because he's still here and she isn't,” Mazinski said of her granddaughter. “She'll never laugh again or talk to us again, and he can do that with his family.

“He still breathes and she doesn't, and that says it all.”

Sudy said she believed it was important for the family to speak out on behalf of her niece, since Crawford — unlike Sarah — was able to tell his version of what happened that night.

“We feel that he was made out to be the victim instead of Sarah,” she said. “Sarah was the victim, not Josh. Sarah was and she is always going to be the victim.”

Her loved ones recalled how Sarah had started to become more confident and assertive in her life, before it ended. She had started her own Scentsy business, and shown a talent for arts and crafts.

“We were very excited for her,” Sudy said. “We were very happy that she was getting the life that she wanted and she worked hard for and that she deserved.”

Baysinger in and out of court clung to a photo of her daughter, while trying to keep hold of her emotions.

“My beautiful daughter had four beautiful children and she was a loving wife,” Baysinger said, “and it got snatched from her by some uncaring human being.

“But my daughter was awesome.”