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PHOENIX (AP) — A northern Arizona man has been resentenced in the rape and murder of a woman who was hitchhiking near Steamboat on the Navajo Nation.
Branden Pete, of Greasewood, had been serving a life sentence in the 2002 death of Charlotte Brown.
He argued for a more lenient punishment after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2012 that juveniles convicted of murder shouldn't face mandatory life sentences without the possibility of parole.
Pete was 16 when Brown was killed.
Federal prosecutors say Pete and three other men raped Brown before she was beaten to death with rocks. They urged U.S. District Judge Stephen McNamee this week to re-impose a life sentence.
McNamee noted the crimes' brutality in resentencing Pete to 59 years in prison with credit for nearly 12 years served.
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