Judge tells Michelle Carter that she cannot be ‘an Amanda Knox’ as she gets 15 month sentence

It is being reported on August 3, 2017 that Michelle Carter was sentenced to fifteen months in prison and the same amount of a suspended sentence.  Judge Moniz handed Carter a total of two and a half years in court with half of the sentence suspended.  Carter was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter last month in the death of her friend Conrad Roy III.

The prosecutors had requested a 7 to 12 year sentence for Carter’s campaign of text messages, encouraging Roy to kill himself.  Roy’s family members gave impact statements just before the sentencing was handed down.  Carter, who had remained stoic throughout most of the trial, was teary eyed and clutching a tissue throughout her sentencing hearing.

Carter is free on probation pending an appeal.  She is required to report to a parole officer and adhere to conditions including not contacting the victim’s family or witnesses.  The judge stated that part of Cater’s motivation in her actions were the result of her “behavior of grandiosity” leading to her”self-aggrandizement,”referring to the fundraisers she held after Roy’s death where she acquired attention as the grieving girlfriend.

The judge further ordered that Michelle Carter may not profit from the telling of her story or the events surrounding Conrad Roy’s death.  Judge Moniz declared,

“This court now orders that you are not to profit from the events of which you now stand convicted and the facts surrounding the same. . .You are prohibited from directly or indirectly engaging in any profit or benefit generating activity relating to the publication of facts or circumstances pertaining to your involvement in the criminal act for which you now stand convicted.  This shall include contracting with any person, . . ., corporation, partnership, association, or legal entity with respect to the commission and or the re-enactment of the crime, by way of movie, book, magazine article, tape recordings of any type, radio, television, or internet presentation, interview, live entertainment of any kind or from the expression of your thoughts, feelings, opinions, or emotions regarding such crime.”

The court appears to be reacting to the infamous ex-convict, Amanda Knox, who has made millions of dollars from talking about the events surrounding the brutal murder of Meredith Kercher in 2007.

Conrad’s mother said in her impact statement that she hoped that her son’s death would result in a law that would prevent this from ever happening again.