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Jury: Tri-Cities bounty hunter killed employee
Saturday, May 12, 2007 - 10:28 PM
BY Josh Green
Reporter
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A Tri-Cities bounty hunter will spend the rest of his life behind bars for First-Degree Murder.
Tonight...a Carter County jury convicted Robert Miller of raping and killing his employee, Kristal Dubuque.
The jury deliberated for three hours. Exactly three years and three months since Gale Gentry last saw her daughter, she heard the words: “guilty.” All 12 jurors said Robert Miller is guilty of killing her daughter.
"This is...as close as you can get to closure,” Gentry said.
Prosecutors say, on a cold February night, Dubuque went to do surveillance with Robert Miller before he raped and killed her. She worked for him three weeks.
“I've never had such a strong case to try before,” Kenneth Baldwin, the prosecutor, said.
Miller talked to police...but his story changed four times. He blamed an employee. He blamed his wife a month after she filed for divorce.
"We had 40 or 50 or 60 different statements in this case,” Baldwin said. “It was amazing.”
This day before Mother’s Day is a bitter-sweet day for a murder victim’s family. You see: the 22 year-old woman who was barely 5-feet tall and 90-pounds was a mother herself. Her son, Skylar, turns five next month.
"Now...if Skylar ever has any questions, I can answer him,” Gentry said. “It's her Mother's Day. This is her day."
…the day Robert Miller walked out of court in handcuffs.
"I'm just happy it's finally over with and I can go celebrate Mother's Day at the cemetery and let her know that we've taken care of it,” Gentry said. “It's over. I'm just so happy."
Miller will eventually be eligible for parole.
