In Pennsylvania, life means life. If you're convicted of first-degree murder, the crime carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole. That explains why about half of the state's oldest inmates remain in Pennsylvania State Prisons. The state has an inmate locator that allows members of the public to search inmates by age, so lehighvalleylive.com used that tool to discover who are the oldest inmates in Pennsylvania and where they're housed.
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Pennsylvania's newest state prison, State Correctional Institution Phoenix, opened in 2018 | AP Photo
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The crimes
We then cross-referenced those inmate names with the state's Unified Judicial System Web portal to find out what crimes they committed, when they were convicted and how long they were ordered to serve. Many of the oldest inmates are killers, but the oldest one isn't. What did he do? When was he convicted? The answers are below.
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Public access to court cases
We relied on the state online databases for all the information below. In some cases, the Unified Judicial System portal had no record of inmates listed in the inmate locator. A spokeswoman from the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections said she couldn't provide clarity on why some inmates weren't listed in the portal. With that sidenote, the following are the 20 oldest inmates in Pennsylvania.
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Inmate: Donald B. Hofler
Age: 84
Crime: He pleaded guilty in 2005 to two counts of third-degree murder. The English professor at Loyola University Maryland killed his wife after she left him and killed her teenage son, according to the Baltimore Sun.
Sentence: 40 to 80 years
Committing County: York
Current location: SCI Laurel Highlands
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Inmate: Paul Gilly
Age: 85
Crime: He was convicted of first-degree murder in 1972. He killed United Mine Workers union reformer Joseph "Jock" Yablonski, his wife and daughter in 1969, according to a triblive.com report.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Washington
Current location: SCI Albion
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Inmate: Shields Frye
Age: 85
Crime: He was convicted of robbery and murder in 1983.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Philadelphia
Current location: SCI Dallas
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Inmate: Ronald Crist Fahlfelder
Age: 85
Crime: No record
Sentence: No record
Committing County: Union
Current location: SCI Laurel Highlands
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Inmate: Louis Dottle Jr.
Age: 85
Crime: He was convicted of first-degree murder in 1991. He killed his wife, his appeal paperwork says.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Lawrence
Current location: SCI Greene
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Inmate: Cornwallis Littles
Age: 86
Crime: He pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in 1964.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Philadelphia
Current location: SCI Laurel Highlands
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Inmate: Thomas Holliday
Age: 86
Crime: He pleaded guilty to more than 200 sex offenses in 2014. He repeatedly sexually abused a girl and filmed it, according to CBS Philadelphia.
Sentence: 935 to 1,800 years
Committing County: Bucks
Current location: SCI Laurel Highlands
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Inmate: Sherman F. Gravitt
Age: 86
Crime: He was convicted of first-degree murder in 2002.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Philadelphia
Current location: SCI Laurel Highlands
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Inmate: Francis Richard Ferri
Age: 86
Crime: He was charged in 1983 and convicted of first-degree murder in 1987. He killed a partner in a drug distribution ring, his appeal says.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Allegheny
Current location: SCI Dallas
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Inmate: Ralph N. Sharp
Age: 87
Crime: No record
Sentence: No record
Committing County: Philadelphia
Current location: SCI Laurel Highlands
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Inmate: Byron G. Hathaway
Age: 87
Crime: He was convicted of murder in 1981. The victim was his wife, Bernadette, an appeal says.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Delaware
Current location: SCI Dallas
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Inmate: George Verle Conard
Age: 87
Crime: He was convicted of first-degree murder in 1982.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Perry
Current location: SCI Huntingdon
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Inmate: Joseph Busija
Age: 87
Crime: He pleaded guilty to seven sex offenses, including four felonies, in 2007. He was a carnival worker who molested two children, according to a triblive.com report.
Sentence: 15 to 30 years
Committing County: Westmoreland
Current location: SCI Laurel Highlands
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Inmate: Alfred J. Stoudt
Age: 88
Crime: He pleaded guilty in 2015 to stalking and indecent assault. His victim was an autistic teen, according to a report in the Reading Eagle.
Sentence: He was paroled, found to be a violator and sentenced in 2017 to one to three years.
Committing County: Berks
Current location: SCI Waymart
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Inmate: Alice Green
Age: 88
Crime: She was convicted at trial of first-degree murder in 1978. A court appeal says she stabbed Horace Alexander for "cheating" on her.
Sentence: Life
Committing County: Philadelphia
Current location: SCI Muncy
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Inmate: Daniel Derence
Age: 88
Crime: He pleaded guilty to three counts of rape in 1996, was paroled and pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography in 2014.
Sentence: Five to 10 years on the first conviction and 9 to 18 months on the second conviction. It's unclear from public records why he's an inmate even though his maximum sentence in both crimes has expired.
Committing County: Allegheny
Current location: SCI Albion
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Inmate: George Rogers
Age: 90
Crime: No record
Sentence: No record
Committing County: Crawford
Current location: SCI Huntingdon
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Inmate: Ralph M. Duncan
Age: 90
Crime: He sexually assaulted a teenage girl and intimidated two witnesses, according to a report on triblive.com. He pleaded guilty to sexual assault and intimidating a witness in 2013.
Sentence: 8.5 to 30 years
Committing County: Indiana
Current location: SCI Houtzdale
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Inmate: Joseph Budick
Age: 91
Crime: He sexually abused a girl between the years of 2005 and 2008, according to the Times Herald of Norristown, Pa. He pleaded guilty to involuntary deviate sexual intercourse in 2014.
Sentence: Four to 10 years
Committing County: Montgomery
Current location: SCI Mahanoy
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Inmate: Byron B. Chadderdon
Age: 92
Crime: He took more than $670,000 from his sister's trust fund, according to a report in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. He pleaded no contest to five counts of theft and single counts of receiving stolen property and misapplication of funds in 2014.
Sentence: Three to seven years
Committing County: Allegheny
Current location: SCI Laurel Highlands
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READ MORE
How bizarre: The most unusual crimes in the Lehigh Valley in 2018
The number of violent crimes in each Lehigh Valley town
Recent crime news in the Lehigh Valley
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Rudy Miller may be reached at rmiller@lehighvalleylive.com. Follow him on Twitter@RudyMillerLV. Find Easton area news on Facebook.
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