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Wisconsin teen Ashlee Martinson will spend 23 years in prison for killing her mother and stepfather last year – shooting her father twice with a shotgun and stabbing her mother more than 30 times with a knife – the Wausau Daily Heraldreports.
Martinson, 18, was sentenced in Oneida County court Friday, according to the paper. She was additionally sentenced to 17 years of supervision following her release. Martinson pleaded guilty in March to the slayings, and was convicted via plea on two counts of second-degree intentional homicide.
While prosecutors had sought a sentence of 40 years in the March 2015 deaths of Jennifer Ayers and Thomas Ayers, Martinson's lawyers had recommended eight years, and further detailed Martinson's long history of physical, mental and verbal abuse, both as a victim and witness.
Court filings have alleged extensive abuse against Martinson, Martinson's siblings and her mother, at Thomas Ayers' hands – as well as alleged abuse against Martinson from her mother's former boyfriends, including a rape at age 9.
That abuse was well documented at Friday's sentencing hearing, according to the Daily Herald.
But with his sentence, Oneida County Circuit Judge Michael Bloom said that it did not appear Martinson's life was threatened at the time of the deaths, according to the paper. Bloom said people are expected to be strong enough not to kill, even in abusive environments.
Martinson declined to speak at the hearing, though she was occasionally visibly emotional, according to the paper.
Thomas Ayers' brother, Don, previously told PEOPLE he was displeased with Martinson's plea, as well as with how his brother had been described as an abuser.
"Thomas and Jennifer are being judged right now by what she is saying about them, but they aren't here to defend themselves because she killed them," he said. "I think she stretched the truth to save her own neck."
But others in the community have acknowledged the abuse.
"I don't agree with the lengthy sentence at all," Martinson's neighbor, Roy Rasmussen, tells PEOPLE. "Twenty-three years? That's a bit much. I don't condone murder but an adolescent who has been abused for years can only take so much until they strike back."
"What she needs is help to get her back on track," Rasmussen says. "Life is not how it has been handed to her. She had a tough life.
"It breaks my heart."
--• Reporting by K.C. BAKER
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