Appellate court affirms president judge’s resentencing of ‘juvenile lifer’
Washington County President Judge Katherine B. Emery was correct when she resentenced a juvenile who had been serving life for a double homicide, state Superior Court determined Tuesday.
Justin M. Secreti, now 41, pleaded guilty in 1995 to participating in the killing and robbery of Charles, 85, and Rose Richert, 81, in their Cecil Township home.
They were found beaten and stabbed Aug. 22, 1993, when Secreti was 16 years old. About $10,000 was stolen from them. Secreti’s older co-defendant, Curtis Ross Johnson Jr., 45, is serving a mandatory life sentence at the State Correctional Institution at Somerset.
Secreti was among a group of inmates affected by two rulings by the U.S. Supreme Court that found mandatory life sentences for juveniles unconstitutional.
In August 2017, Emery resentenced Secreti to a minimum of 35 years on two counts of first-degree murder. He will eventually be eligible for parole.
Secreti appealed the new sentencing Emery imposed, but Superior Court decided that the issues he raised lacked merit. He is serving the sentence at SCI-Greene.