A Massachusetts woman who encouraged her boyfriend to kill himself in dozens of text messages and told him to "get back in" a truck filled with toxic gas was sentenced Thursday to 15 months in prison before the judge granted her a stay in her sentence.
Michelle Carter was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in June by a judge who said her final instruction to Conrad Roy III caused his death. She did not speak at her sentencing.
Juvenile Court Judge Lawrence Moniz granted a stay in her incarceration while her appeals move through the Massachusetts' appellate system. During the stay, the rules of Carter's probation will apply.
The judge called the case, which has garnered international attention, "a tragedy for two families."
Roy's father and sister both spoke in court Thursday. A statement from his mother was also read aloud.
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"I am heartbroken. Our family is heartbroken," said Roy's father, Conrad Roy Jr. "Michelle Carter exploited my son's weaknesses and used him as a pawn... She has not shown any remorse."
Carter, now 20, was 17 when the 18-year-old Roy was found dead of carbon monoxide poisoning in July 2014.
In dozens of text messages, Carter urged Roy to follow through on his talk of taking his own life. "The time is right and you are ready ... just do it babe," Carter wrote in a text the day he killed himself.
Prosecutors asked for a seven- to 12-year sentence.
Carter's lawyer, Joseph Cataldo, asked the judge to spare his client any jail time and instead give her five years of probation and require her to receive mental health counseling. He said Carter was struggling with mental health issues of her own — bulimia, anorexia and depression — during the time she urged Roy to kill himself.
"Miss Carter will have to live with the consequences of this for the rest of her life," Cataldo said. "This was a horrible circumstance that she completely regrets."
The sensational trial was closely watched on social media, in part because of the insistent tone of Carter's text messages.
"You can't think about it. You just have to do it. You said you were gonna do it. Like I don't get why you aren't," Carter wrote in one text.
Cataldo argued that Roy was determined to kill himself and nothing Carter did could change that. He said Carter initially tried to talk Roy out of it and urged him to get professional help, but eventually went along with his plan. Cataldo also argued that Carter's words amounted to free speech protected by the First Amendment.
In convicting Carter, the judge focused his ruling on Carter telling Roy to "get back in" after he climbed out of his truck as it was filling with carbon monoxide and told her he was afraid.
The judge said those words constituted "wanton and reckless conduct" under the manslaughter statute.
Carter and Roy met in Florida in 2012 while both were on vacation with their families. After that, they only met in person a handful of times. Their relationship consisted mainly of texting.
