Manchester Man Gets 20 Years in Prison for Killing His Girlfriend

A 25-year-old Manchester man was sentenced to 20 years in prison Thursday for shooting and killing his girlfriend, Annatassia Keise, in 2012, the Hartford Courant reported.

The sentence was a plea bargain which came about after a Hartford jury was deadlocked last year at the conclusion of Steven Simpson’s murder trial, according to the Courant. Simpson pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in November. Keise’s family opposed the plea agreement.

Prosecutor Anne Mahoney said in court Thursday that she concluded another jury would find it just as difficult to come to a guilty verdict, the newspaper reported: Simpson was intoxicated at the time, had no previous criminal record and looked like a nice person in the video of a police interview.

Simpson’s sentence was for 35 years in prison, suspended after 20 years. If he violates his terms of probation, he faces another 15 years in prison. Simpson apologized to Keise’s family, but her father, Mark, said the sentence was absolutely inadequate.

To find out more about this story, see the Hartford Courant article.