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Watch VideoAdmitted cop-killer Jesse Mathews accepted a plea offer from prosecutors and will serve life without parole plus 25 years for the 2011 shooting death of Chattanooga police Sgt. Tim Chapin.
Chapin stopped Mathews on April 2, 2011, as he fled a robbery of the U.S. Money Shops on Brainerd Road. The sergeant hit Mathews with his patrol cruiser after the fugitive had fired on two other police officers.
The pair traded gunshots until one of Mathews' bullets killed Chapin.
Mathews faced a Jan. 22, 2013, death penalty trial and likely lengthy appeals if convicted.
He had fled a Colorado halfway house where he was on parole for a previous armed robbery.
Mathews met family members in Chattanooga while a fugitive. His mother, father, sister and sister's boyfriend were sentenced in federal court in February for crimes related to aiding him during his flight from Colorado.
For complete details, see tomorrow's Chattanooga Times Free Press.