Mommie Dearest

By Shannon in News on Feb 11, 2007 6:45PM

You think your family's got problems? Have any relatives ever ratted you out to the police? If so, you too could be sent away for a long, long time courtesy of your own mother.

Terrance L. Miller landed in jail in 1997 for armed robbery. Less than two months after being released in 2001, he bungled another robbery and ended up killing 25-year-old Ezra Harvey in Woodridge. The murder went unsolved until November 2004, when Paulyn Miller, Terrance's mother, was brought up on forgery charges. To commute her sentence, she offered to tell police what she knew about the Harvey case, even implicating her son. She wore a wire during two key conversations with Terrance that led to his arrest in January 2005. She received probation in return.

The 30-year-old Terrance was convicted of first-degree murder in December 2006. He wasn't in the Wheaton courtroom on Friday when the judge handed down his sentence, but his mother was. Paulyn broke down sobbing when she found out Terrance would be going to prison for the next 70 years. The Harvey family had no sympathy for the squealer; one of them said in the courtroom, "She's a criminal, and she raised a criminal." Terrance even bragged in police videotapes that he had the smarts to be a Wall Street broker or a lawyer, but instead chose a life of robbery and crime. That doesn't seem like a surefire way to make your mother proud, but in this case, who knows? One thing's for sure: Thanksgiving for the Millers just got a hell of a lot more awkward.

Image via aperfectworld.org.