Kerri Fae Brown was consoled by her attorneys in the minutes before 4th District Judge Lynn W. Davis sentenced her to two consecutive terms of one to 15 years in prison for manslaughter and theft by deception, both second-degree felonies. He ordered Brown be taken to prison immediately.

Prosecutors say Brown killed Mina Pajela, 54, in Pleasant Grove to cover up her theft of nearly $35,000 from the woman. Brown pleaded no contest to the charges in August.

Overcome with emotion, Brown’s only words to the judge were absent of an apology to Pajela’s family.

“Your Honor, there is nothing I can say at this time that’s going to change anything,” she said.

Brown’s words came at no surprise to deputy county prosecutor Sherry Ragan who said Brown has failed to take responsibility or show any remorse for her actions at any time during the case, even after pleading no contest.

Though the Utah Board of Pardons will ultimately determine how long Brown stays in prison, Ragan said in similar cases defendants received 8 to 14 years.

“It depends on her attitude and how she behaves,” Ragan said.

In addition to the prison term, Davis fined Brown $10,000 for each of the charges. He gave her credit for the 138 days she spent in jail after the case was first filed.

Any restitution to Pajela’s family will be resolved when a post-sentencing report on Brown becomes available in the next few weeks.

None of Pajela’s family was in court for the sentencing. Davis ordered that letters and statements from the family be included in Brown’s post-sentencing report.

“The daughter has two little children who will never get to see their grandmother,” Ragan said.

Davis said based on what family, friends and witnesses had said of Pajela, the woman was kind and generous. She had lovingly taken Brown under her wing, even to the point of letting Brown stay at her home.

“I am inclined to say that if she had known Ms. Brown’s financial situation, she would have given her the money she needed,” he said. “It’s a sad day in the chapter of this valley.”

In August, Brown agreed to a plea deal with prosecutors in which she pleaded no contest to the two charges in return for prosecutors dropping a first-degree felony murder charge against her.

Even after her conviction, Davis agreed to let Brown remain free because she said she had court dates in Arizona with child services to determine what would happen to her children after her sentencing. But when the court learned in late August that Brown had either miscommunicated or misrepresented the status of the child custody proceedings, Davis ordered her to return to Utah and go to jail until her sentencing.

Incarcerated in the Utah County Jail for the past 45 days, Brown requested that her sentencing be sooner than the original Nov. 7 date, and insisted Tuesday’s sentencing proceed even though Adult Probation and Parole hadn’t finished its pre-sentencing report in the case.

This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page A1.