NEWS UPDATE: Owatonna man gets life for cold case murder

The elderly man arrested in Owatonna last November in a 50-year-old murder case has pleaded “no contest” and will serve the rest of his life in prison.

On Thursday, Jon Miller, 84, pleaded “no contest” to one count of first-degree murder, which has a mandatory life sentence. The just also ordered him to pay $2,200 in restitution and more than $480 to cover the cost of extraditing him to Wisconsin.

Miller was taken into custody after DNA linked him to the crime. Authorities in Dunn County Wisconsin accused him of stabbing Mary Schlais, who was 25 at the time she hitchhiked from Minneapolis to Chicago for an art show in February 1974.

Miller admitted to picking her up and killing her after she denied his sexual advances.