Sex offender awarded life imprisonment for burning alive pro poker player Susie Zhao

A convicted sex offender who brutally raped and burned alive professional poker player Susie "Susie Q" Zhao received a life term in jail. A little more than a month after being found guilty at trial of first-degree murder and felony murder in the performance of second-degree criminal sexual behavior, Jeffery Morris, 62, was given the obligatory life sentence without the possibility of parole on Thursday, according to The Oakland Press. After less than an hour of deliberation, the jury found the defendant guilty. Morris declined to speak when given the chance at his sentence, but he did indicate that he intended to challenge the decision. “There’s a lot I’d like to say,” the convicted murderer told the judge. “This time I’m not gonna say anything. I’ll wait till I come back for an appeal and begin again.” Judge Martha Anderson described the case as “one of the most agonizing trials” of her career. “I cannot get over the brutality of this murder and the needlessness of it all,” she said. Zhao, a rising star in the world of competitive poker, relocated to Michigan in June 2020 to live with her mother and stepfather after living in Los Angeles. As an adult, she was given a schizophrenia diagnosis. On July 12, 2020, her mother last saw her alive. The next day, her burned remains at the Pontiac Lake Recreation Area in Oakland County were found in a wooded area. Morris, a homeless man convicted of a sex crime in 1989, according to the prosecution, met Zhao at a hotel in Waterford Township where she frequently resided and then carried out what has been described as a twisted sexual fantasy involving bondage. “What happened to her was just so unkind, so brutal and needless,” prosecutor John Skrzynski said of the horrific crime.