Shon Miller pleads guilty
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GONZALES – Shon Miller, whose four first-degree murder convictions and a death sentence were thrown out by the Louisiana Supreme Court in 2007, pleaded guilty today to all the killings.
He will spend the rest of his life in prison, a 23rd Judicial District prosecutor said this afternoon at a news conference.
First Assistant District Attorney Ricky Babin said Miller’s plea was accepted because of an “irreversible medical condition that gives Miller less than year to live.”
Babin said Miller, who uses a wheelchair because he is paralyzed from a gunshot wound inflicted at the time of his arrest, also is afflicted with osteomyelitis of his pelvis.
Miller was convicted in 2000 of shooting his mother-in-law to death in front of her home, and then going to a church where he shot and killed his wife, 2-year-old son and a church deacon.
He killed the three during a March 1999 service at the New St. John Fellowship Church in Gonzales.
Miller’s four convictions and death sentence were reversed and ordered for retrial by the Louisiana Supreme Court after the justices found that state District Judge Alvin Turner’s pre-trial rulings prevented Miller from exercising his right to plead not guilty by reason of insanity.
Miller wanted to change his plea just before his trial from not guilty to not guilty by reason of insanity and the state Supreme Court ruled that Turner’s refusal to allow the change resulted in a “constitutionally flawed jury trial.”
After spending eight years on death row at Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, Miller’s retrial hearings began in late 2007 and his new trial date was set for Aug. 4 of this year.
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If Shon Miller has less than a year to live due to an irreversible illness and he has pleaded guilty, why waste tax dollars to retry him. Just let him serve jail time until his demise. This is crazy, the man killed four people! Perhaps we could use that money and divvy it up amongst our underpaid teachers.
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All around simply horrible horrible story.
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If Shon Miller has less than a year to live and has pleaded guilty to four killings, why waste tax dollars to retry him. Let him serve time until his demise. This is crazy, the man killed four people, three of whom were supposedly his loved ones. Perhaps the state can divvy up the wasted legal funds and give it to our underpaid teachers.
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I think this is great! I hope he rots!
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Favored 1, You need to re-read the article. He was convicted back in 2000, and he appealed his conviction. The Supreme Court overturned his sentence due to him not being able to change his plea, which forced the DA's office to re-try him. Then, Shon Miller decided to plea. They did not waste taxpayer's money on a new trial. It did not even go back to trial. I believe that you need to read more closely before writing comments. I am glad that this is over for the families of the vicitms. People need to think of them and what this has done to them!
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Let's start a count down and see if there is just a little truth to this plea. -- 365 days and counting!
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