A man who kidnapped a supermarket worker and killed her as she prayed for her life was sentenced to die, the first person to get the death penalty in Vermont in almost a half-century.
Donald Fell, 26, was sentenced on Friday by a federal judge who once ruled the death penalty unconstitutional.
Speaking in court for the first time after years of court appearances, Fell apologized twice in a brief statement for stomping 53-year-old Terry King to death in November 2000 on a roadside in Dover, New York.
"The words are inadequate," Fell said, his voice barely audible in court. "I truly am sorry for my crime. What I did was horrible and wrong. I know the wounds will never heal. If it comes down to it in the end that I do die, I understand that it's no less than what I deserve. I truly am sorry."
US District Judge William Sessions III imposed the sentence, which was issued nearly a year ago by the same jury that found Fell guilty.
Fell was the first person sentenced to death in Vermont since 1957, and no one has been executed in the state since 1954. The state abandoned the death penalty in the mid-1960s, although the law remained on the books for another 20 years.
Fell's lawyer, Alexander Bunin, said he did not argue against the sentence because federal law required that it be imposed. But he filed an immediate appeal, which he said would lead to the first direct appeal in 40 years of the death penalty in the judicial district covering the states of Vermont, New York and Connecticut.
King was 53 when she arrived at work and was abducted by Fell and his co-defendant, Robert Lee. The two had just killed Fell's mother and her friend after a night of heavy drinking.
In a confession played at his trial, Fell said he killed King because she could identify him and Lee.
The two were arrested three days later. Lee died in prison by accidental hanging in 2001.
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