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A man who pleaded guilty to fatally stabbing an 82-year-old woman after breaking into her northeastern Indiana home has been sentenced to 95 years in prison.
A Steuben County judge sentenced Matthew R. Hoover, 30, after the Yorktown man pleaded guilty to murder and burglary while armed with a deadly weapon in Wilma Ball’s killing.
Hoover broke into Ball’s home near Lake James in Steuben County in June 2021 and killed her, prosecutors said. Investigators linked him to the killing from DNA on two empty beer cans he left at Ball’s house, court records show.
Hoover was sentenced last week to 65 years for his murder conviction and 30 years for his burglary conviction. The sentences will be served consecutively, The Herald Republican reported.
Hoover’s attorney had sought a total sentence of 50 years on the two charges.
Under the terms of his plea agreement, two other charges — attempted rape and attempted abuse of a corpse — were dismissed.
Neighbors told WANE-TV that Ball was a former home economics teacher, a mother with two children and two stepchildren, and that she was loving, caring, active and athletic.
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