Killer Gets Life Term Under ‘Three Strikes’

A man who fatally stabbed a 17-year-old cheerleader last summer was sentenced to life in prison Wednesday under the state’s “three strikes, you’re out” law.

Johnny Eggers, 44, had pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in the Aug. 19 death of Meeka Willingham. He was sentenced by Pierce County Superior Court Judge Waldo Stone.

The “three strikes, you’re out” law mandates life imprisonment without chance of parole for people convicted three times of certain violent felonies. Eggers had two prior felony convictions for assault in the 1970s.

Willingham’s body was found in the upstairs bedroom of her mother’s house. She had been stabbed 56 times with a kitchen knife.