ASSOCIATED PRESS
GREENEVILLE, Tenn. - A federal judge has rejected the latest
appeal from the ringleader of six young Eastern Kentuckians convicted of
murdering three members of a Knox-ville family returning from a Jehovah's
Witnesses conference in 1997.
Natasha Cornett, of Betsy Layne, has been fighting the conviction
since she was sentenced six years ago to three consecutive life terms
without parole plus 25 years in the slayings of Vidar and Delfina
Lillelid and their daughter, Tabitha, 6.
She lost before the Greene County Circuit Court, the Tennessee
Court of Criminal Appeals and the Tennessee Supreme Court.
Last week she lost before U.S. District Judge Thomas Hull, who
wrote in an order that any further appeal would be totally frivolous.
The Lillelids encountered the Kentuckians at an Interstate 81
rest area, were taken hostage and gunned down. The only survivor was the
couple's son, Peter, 2, who was seriously wounded.
Two days later, the Kentuckians were caught in Arizona in the
Lillelids' van.
In the weeks after the crime, some relatives and friends of the
accused spoke about the suspects' interest in the occult. Cornett, who
was 18 at the time, reportedly believed herself to be the daughter of
Satan.
When the shooting stopped, part of the group "went over and laid
their hands on the bodies to take their souls," prosecutor Berkeley
Bell said.
All six pleaded guilty and were convicted of first-degree murder.
Hull rejected Cornett's claim that she was coerced into the plea and
that her attorneys were ineffective.
A similar appeal from co-defendant Edward Dean Mullins is pending
in U.S. District Court in Greeneville.
http://www.kentucky.com/mld/heraldleader/news/state/8981092.htm
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