Jayme Closs case: Man gets life for murder and kidnapping

The teenager was kidnapped from her house in October 2018

A man in Wisconsin has been convicted of kidnapping 13-year-old Jayme Closs and killing her parents.

Jake Patterson, 21, will serve two life terms without parole for the murder charges and 40 years for kidnapping.

Patterson said he chose to kidnap Ms Closs after seeing her board the bus to school.

She was found alive in January after escaping from the remote cabin where Patterson held her. She had been kept there against her will for 88 days.

The teenager was found by a local teacher, Jeanne Nutter, who was walking her dog. Nutter said that Ms Closs was skinny, dirty and wearing shoes too large for her feet.

Ms Nutter told the Associated Press that the girl shouted "please help me, I don't know where I am, I'm lost".

Barron County Circuit Court Judge James Babler said Patterson's crime was "most heinous and dangerous". He added that Patterson was a danger to society due to his fantasies of "taking multiple girls and killing multiple families".

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According to court documents, Patterson shot Ms Closs's parents James and Denise at the family home in Barron in October 2018, before kidnapping the teenager and driving her 60 miles (97km) north of Barron to the cabin where she was held.

Ms Closs escaped from the cabin one day after Patterson had left. In a written statement, she told the court: "I watched his routine and I took back my freedom. I will always have my freedom, and he will not.

"Jake Patterson can never take away my courage. I feel like what he did was what a coward would do. I was brave, he was not. He can never take away my spirit."

Patterson's lawyers said a "lifetime of social isolation" led him to commit the crime. He told the court he wished he could "take back what I did."