By AP/St. Louis Public Radio
St. Louis – Gregory Bowman has been sentenced to death for killing a teenager in St. Louis County more than 30 years ago.
Circuit Judge David Lee Vincent III on Friday agreed with the jury's recommendation for the death penalty. Bowman's attorney says he will appeal.
Bowman had spent 28 years in prison for two killings in Illinois before his conviction was vacated.
Bowman, of Belmont, Ill., was sentenced in the 1977 killing of 16-year-old Velda Rumfelt in St. Louis County. The jury that convicted the 58-year-old Bowman in October recommended the death penalty.
Bowman was imprisoned 28 years for killing 14-year-old Elizabeth West and 21-year-old Ruth Ann Jany in separate cases in Belleville, Ill., in 1978. The convictions were thrown out after a sheriff's deputy admitted to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that Bowman had been tricked into confessing.