Philip Mathew murdered his wife in 2020 (Representative)
Houston:
An Indian man in the US state of Florida has been sentenced to life in prison for the gruesome murder of his wife in 2020 in the parking lot of a hospital where she worked as a nurse, according to a media report. Philip Mathew pleaded no contest Friday to the first-degree murder of Merin Joy, his wife who was planning to escape an abusive relationship, The Sun Sentinel newspaper reported.
The deal spared him the possibility of a death sentence, the report said.
In 2020, 26-year-old Joy, then a nurse at Broward Health Coral Springs, was stabbed 17 times. Police said Mathew blocked her car with his, slashed her repeatedly and then ran over her body on the ground before driving off.
One of her colleagues later said that Mathew had driven over her “like she was a speed bump,” and when staff rushed to help her, Joy could only shout to them over and over again, “I’m having a baby.” Before she died, she said Police announced that she had revealed the identity of her attacker.
On Friday, Mathew also pleaded no contest to aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. He was immediately sentenced to life in state prison with no chance of parole and a maximum sentence of five years for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
The decision to forego the death penalty was made because of the certainty of the life sentence and because the defendant gave up his right to appeal, said Paula McMahon, spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office.
Joy’s family remains devastated by her terrible loss.
Joby Philip, a cousin on Joy’s side of the family, watched Friday’s hearing on Zoom from his home in Tampa and then relayed the outcome to her family.
Joy’s mother is “glad to know that her daughter’s killer would remain in prison for the rest of his years, and she is relieved to know that the legal process is complete,” he said Friday.
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Source : www.ndtv.com