Texas man gets life term for 1968 Pennsylvania murder
By David DeKok
STROUDSBURG, Pa. (Reuters) - A Texas man was sentenced to life without parole in Pennsylvania on Thursday for the 1968 murder of a steel company employee in what prosecutors say is one of the oldest U.S. cold cases to result in conviction.
Richard Keiper, 69, of Boyd, Texas, was convicted of first-degree murder in July in the shooting death of Alfred Barnes, 40, of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, an assistant to a vice president of Bethlehem Steel Corp, on Oct. 18, 1968.
"For 47 years, my uncle's blood has cried out from the ground. We could not forget him," the victim's nephew, Richard Barnes, told the judge at the sentencing in Monroe County Court of Common Pleas in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania.
"We have no animus against his murderer, but justice must be served," said Barnes, who for years had urged Pennsylvania State Police not to give up on the case.
Judge Jonathan Mark sentenced Keiper to life without parole.
Keiper's sister, Nancy Christman, told Reuters her brother had not received a fair trial, pointing to a lack of physical evidence.
Police said they had no DNA evidence and no weapon, but did have a witness who said that in 1971, Keiper had offered for sale for $10 a pistol he said he used to shoot a Bethlehem Steel employee.
The witness, Quaquo Kelly, reported the encounter to state police the same year, but by that time Keiper had joined a traveling carnival and vanished.
Authorities say the men met when Barnes offered Keiper, then 22 and unemployed, a ride and took him to a bar in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
At his trial, Keiper said he shot Barnes in self-defense near Effort, Pennsylvania.
Assistant District Attorney Michael Mancuso argued that the motive for the crime was stealing the victim’s new Ford Thunderbird, but also suggested it could have been a gay pick-up gone wrong.
Keiper was arrested after Pennsylvania investigators in 2013 re-interviewed Kelly, who stuck to his story.
Police tracked down Keiper to Boyd, a small Texas town about 30 miles (48 km) northwest of Fort Worth. They found him working at a sewage treatment plant and took him into custody.
Mancuso said he believes the Barnes murder is the oldest cold case in Pennsylvania to be successfully prosecuted and likely one of the top three in the United States.
(Editing by Barbara Goldberg and Mohammad Zargham)
