Story highlights
Appeal in case of bizarre 2003 pizza-bomber bank robbery
Deliveryman wore a bomb attached to his neck; He was killed when it exploded
Prosecutors said he was forced to wear bomb
Woman said she was innocent and mentally incompetent to stand trial
A Pennsylvania woman convicted in a bizarre bank robbery that involved a pizza deliveryman with a bomb attached to his neck lost her Supreme Court appeal on Monday.
The justices, without comment, turned aside claims from Marjorie Diehl-Armstrong that she was innocent and mentally incompetent to stand trial.
Diehl-Armstrong, 63, was convicted of conspiracy and other charges related to the death of pizza deliveryman Brian Wells in 2003.
Authorities said Wells walked into a PNC Bank branch in Erie, Pennsylvania, on August 28, 2003, with a pipe bomb locked around his neck, and gave the teller a note demanding money. The robbery netted about $8,700.
Wells was killed when the bomb detonated as he sat in a parking lot after being stopped by police.
The case drew national attention and was the subject of an intense investigation.
Read details of the case, view timeline
Questions arose initially about whether Wells was a willing participant or a murder victim.
Prosecutors have long contended that Wells was involved in planning the robbery, but balked when he realized the bomb was real. They said he was threatened with a gun to make him wear it.
Diehl-Armstrong received a 30-year prison sentence in 2011.
“I am not a crazed killer,” she said at her sentencing. “The true killers are still out there.”
A federal appeals court rejected her appeal in November.
Diehl-Armstrong’s case was delayed because she underwent treatment after the judge in the case found initially that she was mentally incompetent to stand trial.
A third suspect was sentenced to 45 years in prison and a fourth died shortly after the robbery of a drug overdose, officials said.