2 Life Sentences For Teen Convicted Of Beheading Classmate

SALEM, MA — The Lawrence teenager convicted in May of beheading a classmate when he was 15 was sentenced Tuesday to two concurrent prison terms of 30 years to life. Because Mathew Borges, 18, of Lawrence, was a juvenile at the time of the murder, he could be eligible for parole in the future. Adults who commit and are convicted of first degree murder receive an automatic life sentence, but the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled in 2013 the sentence of life without the possibility of parole for a juvenile was unconstitutional.

"There are no more dreams for the dreamer, the brother, the writer and the poet that was Lee Manuel Viloria-Paulino... He has been the soul of this family since he was born," the victim's mother, Katiuska Paulino, said during her victim impact statement to the court. "We are the living dead after he was brutally ripped from our side."

Borges was 15 when he killed Manuel Viloria-Paulino, 16, in November 2016. During his eight-day trial, prosecutors built a case that Borges had killed Viloria-Paulino because the victim had spent time with his girlfriend. They said Borges cut off Viloria-Paulino's head and hands so the body could not be identified. A medical examiner testified that he was unable to determine whether the victim's head was removed before or after he was murdered.

"This vicious murder claimed more than just Lee Paulino's life. Its brutality was shocking to the community and tore at our sense of decency and humanity. Most of all, it has devastated all those who loved Lee. His family will never celebrate his graduation or his birthday. They will never know what he would have become. It is a loss that simply cannot be measured," Essex District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett said in a statement. "Understanding that there is no number of years that can restore this family's loss, it is my hope that they can now find some peace."