A defendant’s mother broke down in tears Wednesday outside a Douglas County courtroom after her son received a life sentence for first-degree murder.

“They found an innocent man guilty,” Deloris Walker said of her son, 42-year-old Michael W. Kesselring. “My son didn’t do this. That’s the worst part.”

A jury convicted the Topeka resident earlier this year of kidnapping and killing Dale A. Miller, whose body was found two years ago near Lecompton.

Miller, a drug runner for a Topeka syndicate, disappeared in fall 2000 after he came under suspicion of stealing two duffel bags full of marijuana, cocaine and methamphetamine from a storage shed.

Walker and other members of Kesselring’s family said they were angry that two other Topeka men who admitted taking part in the kidnapping, Gary F. Holmes and Curtis D. Callarman, received lighter sentences in exchange for their testimony against Kesselring.

In court Wednesday, Kesselring told Judge Paula Martin that though he was sorry about the death, he didn’t kill Miller. Kesselring maintained throughout his trial that he had nothing to do with the kidnapping, but other witnesses testified seeing him with the co-defendants the night of the crime.

Miller’s father, a cab driver from Topeka, said he felt Kesselring received an appropriate sentence.

¢ Murder trial goes to jury (3-15-03)¢ Murder trial ends with conviction (3-19-03)

“If he has to wake up every morning thinking about what happened, yeah,” Dale E. Miller said. “My son … he wasn’t a lamb or an innocent person. He’d be right there in prison with him.”

Kesselring will be eligible for parole on the murder charge in roughly 20 years, but after that, he’ll begin serving a 19-year sentence for aggravated kidnapping and conspiracy to commit kidnapping.

Kesselring’s attorney, Martin Miller, said he planned to appeal the conviction.