The teenage cousin of 10-year-old Wisconsin girl Lily Peters, whose killing stunned Chippewa Falls in 2022, has been sentenced to life in prison after admitting to her murder.
Carson Peters-Berger, now 18, received the life sentence Wednesday for killing Lily on April 24, 2022. Authorities said he convinced her to leave a trail in Chippewa Falls and go with him into a nearby wooded area.
Prosecutors said Peters-Berger, who was 14 at the time, attacked his younger cousin after leading her away, punching her in the stomach, knocking her down, striking her with a stick and strangling her before sexually assaulting her.
He pleaded guilty to one count of first-degree intentional homicide under a plea agreement. As part of that deal, charges of first-degree sexual assault and first-degree sexual assault of a child were dismissed.
Still, Judge Steven Gibbs considered the dismissed allegations when imposing the sentence, ordering Peters-Berger to serve life in prison with the possibility of extended supervision only after 25 years.
Prosecutors had initially agreed that Peters-Berger could seek early release after 20 years, but Gibbs increased the minimum time behind bars to 25 years, noting that few crimes are more severe than first-degree intentional homicide, the Leader-Telegram reports.
‘It shook this community,’ Gibbs said in court, referring to Lily’s death. ‘You lured Lily into a wooded area and committed this offense.’
The judge also said he believes in ‘giving people a second chance after you paid your debt to society,’ according to WEAU.
Carson Peters-Berger, now 18, was sentenced on Wednesday to serve life in prison for killing Lily Peters on April 24, 2022
Lily Peters, 10, was strangled to death and raped in Wisconsin in 2022
The hearing marked the first time Peters-Berger appeared in court in person, even though he has remained in custody on a $1 million cash bond since he was arrested in 2022.
His attorneys have previously attempted to have him tried in juvenile court, arguing that a life sentence would only be ‘punishment for the sake of punishment, which is not what the law permits for juveniles.’
But the judge refused, saying the offenses were too serious to warrant such a move. A state appeals court also kept the case in adult court.
At the sentencing on Wednesday, the teenager spoke quietly, only answering ‘yes’ to each question the judge asked him.
When he was then asked whether he would like to make a statement before the sentencing, Peters-Berger declined to speak.
He has previously admitted to police that he strangled his 10-year-old cousin to death before raping her, leaving her abused corpse on the trail and returning home.
The young girl was reported missing by her father around 9pm after she failed to return home from her aunt’s residence.
After hearing Lily was reported missing, Peters-Berger allegedly returned to her body, dragged her a few feet off the trail and covered her with leaves.
A volunteer search party discovered the girl’s body partially naked the next morning.
Peters Berger is pictured when he was 14. He pleaded guilty on Wednesday to one count of first-degree intentional homicide as part of a plea deal that saw charges of first-degree sexual assault and first-degree sexual assault of a child dismissed
Lily was reported missing by her father after she failed to return home from her aunt’s house. Her corpse was found by a volunteer search party the next morning
Peters-Berger is the son of convicted pedophile Adam Berger, who spent three years in jail after being caught with a stash of pornographic images of prepubescent girls on his phone.
According to charging documents, 10 pornographic photos showing very young girls were found on his phone, according to court papers.
He also had drug paraphernalia including four crack pipes in his home.
When his son was charged, Berger was living in a halfway house in Eau Claire after being released from Oshkosh Correctional Institution in April 2021. He remained on supervised probation and is on the sex offender registry.
He and his lawyers opposed extended probation at the time because he would not have had unsupervised visits with his son, who he described in a letter as being ‘the best of me.’
Peters-Berger is the son of convicted pedophile Adam Berger, who spent three years in jail after being caught with a stash of child porn. The father and son are pictured together
In 2017, before Berger was convicted of child porn offenses but after he had been arrested and charged, he had run his car into Peters-Berger’s mother, Lauri Davis.
Although not allowed solo contact with his son, who was then aged eight, the charging papers say they were in the vehicle together.
Davis said Berger drove the car at her, leaving her injured when she rolled off the hood and ended up on the ground.
When Berger was sent to jail, all physical contact with his son ceased, but in a jailhouse letter, Berger said he emailed the boy daily, spoke to him regularly while he was with his grandmother and mailed him a crochet blanket he had made in prison.
He said he dreamed of a future with his son, adding that he wanted unsupervised contact with his son because ‘he is not a victim of my offense.’ He added: ‘My son is the best part of me.’
Chippewa County District Attorney Wade Newell seemed to have referenced Peters-Berger’s sordid past at the hearing on Wednesday, saying the teen ‘has clear rehabilitative needs that need to be addressed.’
Judge Gibbs agreed, telling Peters-Berger, ‘Whether you take it to heart is totally up to you.’
Peters-Berger will be eligible for extended release after 25 years behind bars
Judge Steven Gibbs told Peters-Berger he believes in giving people second chances
The court also heard from Dana Whitcome, the stepmother to Lily’s sisters, who argued that prosecutors’ agreement to 20 years behind bars before the option of an extended release ‘is not enough time for what was taken.’
‘As a family, we don’t want to see another family harmed by Mr Peters-Berger,’ she said. ‘This one act has devastated an entire family on both sides, that will never be the same.
‘The victim deserved far better than this,’ she continued.
Peters’ friends also shared how her loss affected their lives.
‘She was my light,’ said Kiara Stevens. ‘There were times when I just didn’t want to do it anymore, but Lily was that kind of person that made you want to keep going.’
In the end, Newell said he was glad to have avoided a trial.
‘With [a] trial, it’s always a risk of what could happen with it. You never know what would happen, and it becomes very traumatic for the family to hear what occurred,’ he said, noting testimony would include details about how Peters was killed.
‘It’s a very brutal situation,’ he said. ‘It should be avoided whenever possible.’
Whitcome also said that the family can now move forward.
‘We can start to look toward healing and sharing that spirit you’ve heard from so many about Lily,’ she said. ‘We are working to continue that memory of her.’
She added that she is satisfied with the work of the district attorney’s office in pursuing justice in the case and thanked the community for all the support they have given to her family.
‘People who didn’t even know Lily reached out with acts of kindness,’ Whitcome said, noting, ‘We continue to see purple lights on people’s porches.’
