From today's Derrick:
"It was for their cruelty - for the life they took more than 13 years ago and the remorse they haven't shown in the years since - that Venango County Judge Oliver J. Lobaugh sentenced two brothers to spend the rest of their lives in prison Thursday.
"The world was a better place because of Shauna (Howe) and the world would be a much better place without you walking free ever again," Lobaugh told Timothy and James O'Brien in a calm, even voice.
The night Shauna attended a Girl Scout Halloween party at a home for the elderly on Oct. 27, 1992, the Oil City brothers were lurking, plotting, Lobaugh said. After grabbing her from the Oil City street corner on that autumn night, they subjected her to extreme acts of cruelty and violence before throwing her from a railroad trestle to die in the shallow creek below."
Snip
Timothy and James O'Brien were convicted by an Indiana County jury in October of kidnapping, sexually assaulting and killing 11-year-old Shauna in 1992, an act that, according to a third defendant in the case, was a Halloween prank gone wrong.
In addition to life sentences for second degree murder, Timothy O'Brien, 39, and James O'Brien, 34, were each ordered to serve 10 to 20 years for involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and 5 to 10 years for criminal conspiracy to commit kidnapping. The sentences in the Howe case are to run consecutively, and they will also run consecutively with sentences the brothers are already serving for other, unrelated crimes, Lobaugh said.
Both were also determined to be sexually violent predators under Megan's Law."
Snip
"Even as she left North Carolina to travel to Pennsylvania for Thursday's court date, Lucy Brown said she was calling the courthouse to make sure the sentencing was still on.
That the brothers will be behind bars for the rest of their lives is "wonderful," she said.
"They're gone and they're not coming back."
Although Lucy Brown and her family count the conviction and life sentences as a victory, more court dates still loom in the case.
Eldred "Ted" Walker, the third defendant who pleaded guilty in the case and testified against the O'Briens, asked the court to withdraw his guilty plea immediately after the O'Briens' trial. A ruling still hasn't been issued in the matter."
Snip
Last year, a softball tournament was held in Shauna's memory to raise money for her family to make the trip back to Pennsylvania to attend the trial.
Sibble plans to keep the softball tournament going to keep Shauna's memory alive and raise money for other families that may face similar financial struggles.
Also in attendance at Thursday's sentencing were four of the Indiana County jurors.
Although they declined to comment, one male juror said he and the others returned because they also sought closure."
http://thederrick.com/
