Print edition: 
NEWTON — Chad Carr will spend at least 17 years in prison for the murder of a North Newton toddler.
Harvey County District Judge Richard Walker said the sentencing laws of Kansas left him little discretion, as he followed a plea agreement that gave Carr the maximum penalties for second-degree murder, aggravated battery and child abuse. Carr pleaded guilty to those charges Nov. 3 in the March 2010 killing of 19-month-old Vincent Hill.
Walker handed down a sentence of nearly 20 years — 241 months — but recognized that Carr could earn three years’ good-time credit.
Carr was the live-in boyfriend of the boy’s mother.
“I’m sorry for what happened and if there was any way to change it I would,” Carr, 28, told the judge.
Investigators also found the boy’s mother, Katheryn Nycole Dale, knew about the abuse her son suffered. She pleaded no contest to child abuse and aggravated child endangerment and was sentenced to more than three years in prison.
An autopsy showed the boy suffered blunt-force injuries and most likely died by suffocation. “Some pretty awful evidence was presented to the court,” the judge said.
Walker said he hoped the case would call attention to child abuse in the small community and cause changes, such as parental education, reporting signs of child abuse and improving the way authorities react to and investigate such instances.
“Vincent Hill didn’t have to die,” Walker said. “There’s a lot of anger in this case, and I’ve even experienced some of that. But the only use anger has is if people use that anger to make changes in the community so there aren’t other Vincent Hills.”
After being released from prison, Carr will be under state supervision for another three years. He will have to register as a violent offender under Kansas law.
