EUGENE, Ore. (AP) — A judge in Eugene, Ore., has sentenced a Lowell man to life in prison for shooting to death his wife’s ex-husband inside his community’s Kingdom Hall of Jehovah’s Witnesses.
The Register-Guard reports that Robert Riley Gonzales was sentenced Thursday in the death last May of Ken Mort, of Fall Creek. The 35-year-old Gonzales will have the chance for parole after 25 years.
Gonzales has pleaded guilty last week to murder and to four kidnapping charges for holding Mort and three other church elders against their will. Lane County Judge Karsten Rasmussen also sentenced him to another six years and 10 months on the kidnapping charges.
Prosecutors say the killing stemmed from bitterness over a disputed sexual abuse allegation against Gonzales.
