Murderer of newlyweds gets new life sentences

But felon will still have special hearing on bid for release

A teen killer who spent 20 years on Florida’s Death Row in the killing of Miami newlyweds received two new life Monday.

But Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Laura Johnson, while resentencing Cleo LeCroy to consecutive terms of life in prison, said the felon will have a special hearing on his bid for freedom.

“Everyone needs to understand this matter is not over,” Johnson said, advising relatives of murder victims John and Gail Hardeman.

John Hardeman’s youngest son, Matthew, later told reporters his family continues to lack closure 37 years after the killings.

“Although we feel the sentencing is appropriate, we feel no one wins,” said Hardeman, 40. “What the family expected to be finite sentencing has continued to be revisited and made it impossible to heal.”

The judge said she undersentences stands the “whole extended family has been devastated and continues to be devastated” from the slayings.

Johnson said she was required to order new sentences for LeCroy, based on a 2012 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that declared mandatory life terms for juveniles who kill were unconstitutional.

Because of the pending hearing, LeCroy, 55, will remain in Palm Beach County Jail rather than return to state prison under the new sentences.

He’s entitled under state law to an additional review of his case because he was only 17 when he gunned down the couple on Jan. 4, 1981, and he’s already been locked up for at least 25 years.

Defense attorney Jim Eisenberg said he’s optimistic LeCroy will be released based on exemplary conduct behind bars for nearly four decades and little if any chance of new crimes.

“The criteria looks to how the client has done in prison and puts greater weight on that than it does for sentencing purposes,” he explained.

LeCroy, who was abused as a child, has had a nearspotless prison behavior record. Records show he obtained a high school diploma while in prison.

But Assistant State Attorney Andrew Slater argued LeCroy should never leave prison because the crimes were so heinous and, “The fact that he's been a good prisoner proves nothing.”

Prior to the murders, LeCroy’s immediate family and the victims, married less than a year, had been camping separately at the 4,400-acre Brown’s Farm Hunting Area in western Palm Beach County.

John Hardeman III, who worked for a pest control business, died from a shotgun blast to his face. He was 27 and survived by two boys from a previous marriage, 3 and 5 years old.

Gail, a secretary for a ceramic tile company, was shot in the head, neck and chest with a .22-caliber gun. She was 24.

Prosecutors said LeCroy killed the Hardemans as part of a robbery; he wanted John’s new $100 rifle with the goal of selling it.

In 1986, LeCroy was convicted and sentenced to death for Gail’s murder and life in prison for John’s slaying. He was taken off Death Row in 2005 after the U.S. Supreme Court banned the death penalty for juvenile killers.

”We fought for justice for my dad and his wife and will continue to celebrate their lives,” Matthew Hardeman said, before leaving the courthouse Monday with his brother Charles, and other loved ones.