Man who killed child is sentenced to life

The girl's mother already has pleaded guilty to her part in the crime.
KITTANNING, Pa. (AP) -- A man was sentenced to life in prison without parole Friday in the starvation death of his 4-year-old daughter, whose body was found stuffed into a picnic cooler outside his home.
Jurors told an Armstrong County judge Friday night that they were unable to decide whether James Tatar deserved death by lethal injection or a life sentence. Under Pennsylvania law, a life sentence is automatically imposed if a jury deadlocks on the question of death.
The jury convicted Tatar, 42, of Parks Township, of first-degree murder Thursday in the death of Kristen Tatar.
Set out with trash
Kristen's 111/2-pound body, partly decomposed and emaciated, was found stuffed in a picnic cooler that had been set out behind her Parks Township house for trash pickup in August 2003, about a month after she died.
Tatar and the girl's mother, Janet Crawford, 36, both were charged with criminal homicide in the girl's death.
Crawford pleaded guilty in September and testified against Tatar. Armstrong County Judge Kenneth Valasek held a hearing last month to determine the degree of homicide Crawford will face, but he sealed the decision, saying it wouldn't be publicized until after James Tatar's trial.
Under Crawford's plea agreement, the most she could face is a life sentence for first-degree murder. Valasek said Friday that he will schedule a court date for next week to announce Crawford's fate.
Crawford testified that Tatar taunted the girl with crackers and wouldn't allow her to eat dinner with the rest of the family because she wasn't potty-trained. Prosecutors said the girl was tied down in an attic and not fed for several days before she died.
Defense's contention
Tatar's attorneys characterized Crawford as a pathological liar who abused the girl and misled Tatar about her condition while he worked out of town as an asbestos remover.
The jury weighing Tatar's fate was selected about 60 miles away in Somerset County because of pretrial publicity the charges generated. The panel has been sequestered since the beginning of the trial last week.
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