Girlfriend of Greensburg-area dentist convicted of killing his wife on safari sentenced to 17 years

The girlfriend of a former Greensburg-area dentist convicted of murdering his wife on an African safari was sentenced Friday to 17 years in prison for being an accessory to the crime.

Ana Rudolph, daughter of 57-year-old victim Bianca Rudolph, said that Lori Milliron had “plotted to eliminate” her mother.

“Lori, you have taken my parents,” Rudolph said directly to Milliron, but “despite everything you have done you will never take my soul. This might be difficult to understand … because you don’t have one.”

Milliron was convicted last year of perjury, being an accessory to a murder after the fact and obstructing a grand jury in a case that’s garnered national attention. She was charged alongside Lawrence “Larry” Rudolph who was convicted last year of fatally shooting his wife while on a 2016 hunting trip in Zambia. His sentencing, originally set for this week, has been postponed.

Rudolph founded and once operated Hempfield-­based Three Rivers Dental Group, which has offices in Greensburg, Cranberry, Green Tree, Jennerstown and Washington.

The Rudolphs, who married in 1982, met when he was in dental school at the University of Pittsburgh and she was an undergrad.

John Dill, an attorney for Milliron, said the prison sentence was longer than what is typically doled out for such charges, calling it “excessive” and vowing to appeal. Dill argued that the convictions were merely based on Milliron’s perjury charges and do not implicate her in the execution of the crime.

Standing in front of the judge on Friday, Milliron insisted she was innocent of the crimes but said she was “sympathetic” to the Rudolph family.

Judge William J. Martínez argued that the long sentence was deserved because evidence pointed to Milliron “encouraging” the crime. Martínez added that Milliron seemed “unrepentant” in part because he judged her emotionally unmoved when she was shown graphic images and listened to wrenching testimony during the trial.

After Bianca Rudolph’s death in 2016, Lawrence Rudolph claimed his wife accidentally shot herself while packing to leave Zambia for the United States. Later, Rudolph collected millions in accidental death insurance payments. After an FBI investigation, however, authorities charged Rudolph in 2021 with her murder.

Rudolph maintains that his late wife of 34 years accidentally killed herself, but prosecutors countered that evidence showed that that was impossible because the wound to her heart came from a shot fired from 2 to 3.5 feet away.

Prosecutors argued that he killed Bianca after receiving an ultimatum from Milliron, a former hygienist and manager of his office, that he divorce his wife.

Throughout their marriage, they went on frequent hunting trips to Africa, and Bianca Rudolph became a well-­respected international hunter. She was the former president of the Pittsburgh chapter of the Safari Club International. The couple moved to Arizona from Pennsylvania around 2012, although Lawrence Rudolph’s dental practice remained here and he traveled back and forth regularly.

The case has drawn national attention with network news progams profiling it.