'American Sniper' killer sentenced to life in prison

Eddie Ray Routh has been found guilty and sentenced to life in prison without parole for shooting and killing Chris Kyle, the soldier celebrated in the film American Sniper, and his friend Chad Littlefield.

The jury deliberated for a little more than two hours before reaching a verdict. Prosecutors chose not to go for the death penalty and had been seeking a life sentence without parole.

The case went to the jury on Tuesday after a prosecutor said in his closing arguments that Routh, 27, acted coldly and deliberately in a deadly ambush of the pair at a Texas gun range in February 2013.

Routh, a former U.S. Marine, was found guilty of fatally shooting Kyle and Kyle's friend, Chad Littlefield, multiple times at a gun range about 110 km southwest of Fort Worth in February 2013. Prosecutors said he ambushed the two from the rear, waiting for Kyle to completely unload his weapon at the range before he attacked with a barrage of gunshots.

Routh did not testify during the trial but his court-appointed lawyers claimed that at the rifle range he came to believe Kyle and Littlefield were plotting to kill him, so he had to shoot them first, in a misguided form of self-defence. The jury heard that Kyle himself had sent a text message to Littlefield as the three drove to the range describing Routh as “straight-up nuts”.

However the prosecution argued that Routh’s actions after the murders – he confessed to his family, tried to evade arrest and told an officer during questioning that he had made a mistake – showed he knew right from wrong. They suggested he was jealous of Kyle and murdered him and Littlefield in a fit of pique because they behaved coldly towards him on what was supposed to be a therapeutic afternoon outing to the range.