ERIE — A man who was teenager when he killed a 5-year-old Pennsylvania girl has been resentenced to life in prison by a judge who said he was “permanently incorrigible” and should never leave prison.
Scott Schroat had pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in the 1992 slaying of Lila Ebright. She went missing outside her family’s rowhouse in Erie, sparking a massive search that ended 13 days later when a man rummaging for scrap metal found her body in a trash bin.
Authorities say the girl was repeatedly choked and stabbed. Schroat has said her death was accidental.
Schroat, now 44, received a term of life without parole but was eligible for resentencing because he was 17 at the time of the killing. That was because the U.S. Supreme Court ruled mandatory life sentences unconstitutional for juveniles in 2016.
