Hammer killer sentenced
to life without parole

The murder took place at
a Burger King outlet near UH

By Susan Kreifels
Star-Bulletin

Monte L. Young was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole today for using a hammer to murder a man waiting for coffee at the University Avenue Burger King last year.

Circuit Administrative Judge Victoria Marks upheld her June decision that the murder fit the definition of the state's law to eliminate parole for murders that are "especially heinous, atrocious and cruel ... manifesting exceptional depravity ... especially tortuous to the victim." She also had ruled that the law was constitutional.

Marks, who in May convicted Young of murder in the second-degree in a nonjury trial, today repeated the facts of the case that led to her June decision. She said it was an "unprovoked attack" on Paul Ulbrich "using both the claw and blunt end of the hammer."

She said witnesses testified that Young used one or both hands, paused between blows to assess damage, and that the victim's "screams were heard. This was not a painless death."

When Marks convicted Young, she said he had a mental disorder at the time of the crime caused by his own use of illegal drugs and alcohol, but that did not prevent him from knowing right from wrong or acting within the law.

Young, who did not testify at his trial, today apologized for the murder and said that he had taken a correspondence course on the "way to happiness."

He later asked for permission to speak, disagreeing with some of the testimony given by witnesses during the trial.

But Marks said that he was not under oath, had chosen not to testify at the trial, and that it was "easier when all is said and done to make statements when you're not under oath."