Three years after Connecticut abolished the death penalty for any future crimes, the state's highest court on Thursday declared capital punishment unconstitutional, sparing the lives of the 11 remaining death row inmates, including the two men who carried out the Petit family murders.
Steven Hayes and Joshua Komisarjevsky now get life sentences for a 2007 home invasion robbery in which they raped and strangled Jennifer Petit, tied her daughters Hayley and Michaela to their beds, and set the home ablaze.
Petit's sister, Cynthia Hawke Renn, told NBC News that she is "disheartened" by the Connecticut Supreme Court's finding that a 2012 legislative repeal of the death penalty should also apply to those who committed their crimes earlier.
