NJ Serial Killer's 160-Year Prison Sentence Upheld By Court

ESSEX COUNTY, NJ — A New Jersey appeals court this week upheld a 160-year prison sentence for Khalil Wheeler-Weaver, a serial killer and rapist convicted of murdering three women and attempting to kill another, according to court documents.

Wheeler-Weaver was convicted in 2019 of killing Sarah Butler, a 20-year-old college student from Montclair; Joanne Brown, a 33-year-old Newark resident; and Robin West, 19, of Philadelphia, between August and November 2016.

A jury also convicted Wheeler-Weaver of attempting to kill a fourth woman, who escaped and testified against him during his trial.

RELATED:

• Essex County Serial Killer Charged With 4th Murder: Prosecutor
• NJ Serial Killer Who Murdered Montclair Student Sentenced To Jail
• Jury Convicts Essex County Man Who Raped, Killed 3 Women

Finally, Wheeler-Weaver was convicted of kidnapping, aggravated sexual assault, desecration of human remains and aggravated arson. He was sentenced to a combined prison term of 160 years.

In 2022, he was charged with a fourth murder in connection with the death of a 15-year-old girl. The case is pending.

In appealing his conviction, attorneys for Wheeler-Weaver argued that each murder case should have been tried separately. Attorneys claimed the judge gave incorrect instructions to the jury and that police violated Wheeler-Weaver's Miranda rights.

Wheeler-Weaver's attorneys also argued that his sentence was excessive, according to court documents.

In its 34-page ruling, the three-judge panel ruled that Wheeler-Weaver's arguments were without merit and upheld his prison term.

"In the final analysis, the enormity of the sentence is amply justified by the horrific nature of (the) defendant's crimes," the judges wrote.

Prosecutors said that Wheeler-Weaver used dating apps to lure the women into sexual encounters, then attacked and strangled them. The fourth woman who survived an attack and testified at the trial said it changed her life, the Associated Press reported.

Authorities found Butler's body in Eagle Rock Reservation in West Orange in December 2016 after the Jersey City University student was reported missing a week earlier. Her friends later used social media to help police find Wheeler-Weaver, gaining access to her accounts, setting up a fake profile and luring him to a meeting in Montclair.

Authorities said Wheeler-Weaver killed Brown in October 2016. Her body was discovered in a vacant home in Orange in December 2016.

Prosecutors said that Wheeler-Weaver killed West in Orange before setting fire to the vacant home where her body was discovered. At the time of her murder, the 19-year-old was living in Union Township. She was reported missing in September 2016, authorities said.

Wheeler-Weaver pleaded not guilty to the killings in 2017.