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Sawyer County man gets life sentence for killing 93-year-old woman

The Wisconsin man found guilty last fall of killing a 93-year-old woman in Sawyer County will serve a life sentence without the possibility of parole, a district judge ruled Monday.

Christopher L. Roalson
Christopher L. Roalson was found guilty Friday, Sept. 21, 2012, of first-degree murder in the death of 93-year-old Irena Roszak. He was sentenced Monday, March 4, 2013, to life in prison with no chance of parole. (2010 file / Sawyer County Sheriff's Department)

The Wisconsin man found guilty last fall of killing a 93-year-old woman in Sawyer County will serve a life sentence without the possibility of parole, a district judge ruled Monday.

Christopher Roalson, of Radisson, was found guilty in September in the May 2009 killing of Irena Roszak. Judge Kenneth Kutz also ruled that Roalson, 30, and his accomplice, Austin Davis, must pay restitution to Roszak's family with what they earn working in prison.

The life sentence was mandatory under Wisconsin law and the only question Monday was about the parole.

Davis, 18, told investigators he accompanied Roalson to Roszak's house in Radisson on May 3, 2009. He initially thought they were going to a "dude's house." He said he then learned that Roalson went to the woman's house with the intention of killing someone.

Davis said his sole intention was to be "a lookout" and take things of value from the home. All he took, he said, was a smoking pipe. They had smoked marijuana earlier in the day, Davis said.

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Davis said Roalson told him he stabbed the woman at least 10 times. He saw him grab a wooden chair and heard him break it over the woman as she screamed for her life.

"He was saying things like if God was actually here today she would be saved, or something like that," Davis told investigators on an audio tape. "He was saying like the devil is his God. And the devil is Satan's son or something like that. I thought it was weird," he added, and then laughed.

Davis, of Ojibwa, received a sentence of eight years in prison followed by seven years of supervision after being found guilty of second-degree intentional homicide.

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