BATAVIA, Ohio — A man has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for shooting his three young sons to death in their Ohio home last year.
A Clermont County judge sentenced 33-year-old Chad Doerman to three consecutive life sentences Friday after he pleaded guilty to murder. He was also sentenced to an additional 16 years on two counts of assault for injuring his ex-wife and stepdaughter.
Prosecutor Mark Tekulve had originally announced that he would seek the death penalty for the murders on June 15, 2023 in Monroe Township, about 120 kilometers west of Columbus. The defendants Clayton Doerman (7), Hunter Doerman (4) and Chase Doerman (3) suffered murders there.
But on Friday he referred to the trauma that the surviving family members “experienced that day and continue to experience every day”.
“My job, as I saw it this week, was to free them from this additional torment,” he told reporters on Friday.
Prosecutors had previously said Doerman, who was arrested after being found sitting on a stoop in the home, admitted to planning the murders and chasing one of the boys in a field after the child tried to escape. Defense attorneys had argued he suffered from severe mental illness.
Laura Doerman, the children’s mother and the defendant’s ex-wife, cried as a prosecutor read her statement in court, saying her life had been “ripped away and destroyed.”
“I would do anything to give her a push on the swing, to tuck her in one more time and hear her little gestures that say, ‘I love you,'” she said. “… I’m angry, frustrated and so sad. The sadness will never go away because it’s all the love that’s left with nowhere to go.”
In a further statement by the prosecutor after the verdict was announced, she said she was “fully in agreement” with the resolution of the case.
“No punishment will ever bring my boys back,” she wrote. “The guarantee that he will spend the rest of his life behind bars is the best thing for my family.”
The prosecutor said he plans to provide more details about the case at a news conference on Monday. Laura Doerman thanked prosecutors and first responders and asked for privacy. She and the family “mourn every day” for the boys. But she also asked that people remember the children as they were before the events of that day.
“Remember them as the three little boys who loved fishing, go-karting and swimming,” she said. “Remember them as the little boys who were always at the baseball fields or running around outside. Remember them as the boys who wanted to have fun and were inseparable.”
