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Man gets two life sentences in killing of Beaver Falls couple

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BEAVER (AP) – A man convicted last month in the drug-related slaying of a Western Pennsylvania couple has been formally sentenced to consecutive life terms plus an extra 27 to 54 years in prison.

A judge told Robert Burgess on Tuesday that the June 2008 killings of Richard and Demetria Harper were “savage and brutal.”

Prosecutors say the Harpers, who were both 32, were tied up and shot in the head in the basement of their Beaver Falls home. The killers had locked the couple’s 8- and 10-year-old daughters in a small furnace room.

Jurors deliberated the death penalty for more than three hours last month before telling a judge they were hopelessly deadlocked.

Twenty-seven-year-old Devon Shealey, also of Pittsburgh, was previously convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to two consecutive life terms.

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