VANCOUVER, Wash. -- A convicted kidnapper serving time for attacking a woman in 1978 was set to be sentenced to life in prison Friday.
Michael A. Hersh was found guilty earlier this month in the slaying of a Vancouver woman.
Newly discovered DNA evidence linked Hersh to the scene of the murder of Norma Simerly. He was 17 at the time of the attack.
Jurors found Hersh guilty of first degree murder and first degree rape. He was sentenced tp 33 years-to-life.
"I'm just glad that justice was served and hopefully he'll never be able to get out and do anything again," the victim's son Bradley Elliott said.
Hersh was up for a parole review in 2011, but he will now serve a minimum 20 years. The prosecutor said the state would seek more time under a third strike rule.
"She was a wonderful person, very articulate, fun to be with loved to dance, just a great person. I don't think they ever really had another suspect, it was so identical to what he had done to joy," Marge Boyer, the sister of Simerly said. "Like anybody being murdered, it's hard, it's hard to go on without them 25 and her grandkids miss her, they never did get to know her."
Hersh's attack and kidnapping of another Vancouver woman, Joy Fletcher happened almost three months after the Simerly killing.
Boyer said she was elated.
"Just to know that he's going to be put away, he can't do it to another woman,"
"I'm so happy for them, they're great people. They've gone through a lot, it's wonderful for them to get this result," prosecutor Tony Golik said.
Hersh said in a letter to the judge that he was innocent and at the time of the crime he was a teenager who made "really bad choices."
(KGW Reporter Amanda Burden contributed to this report)
