A woman charged with shooting her boyfriend in 2021 pleaded guilty to third degree murder and was sentenced yesterday in Indiana County Court.
Indiana County District Attorney Robert Manzi announced 31-year-old Matraca Vrana of Blairsville re-entered the plea before testimony could start in her trial on Tuesday. She had entered a guilty plea to the same charge in March of 2024 but rescinded that plea last June. Manzi said police were called out on September 10th of 2021 by Vrana who claimed her boyfriend tried to hurt himself. Despite lifesaving efforts, he eventually died from his injury. Investigators determined that she lied in her call to police and she confessed to picking up the gun and shooting him.
Vrana was ordered by Senior Judge Oliver Lobaugh to serve between eight and a half to 20 years in state prison and four years of supervised release upon her parole.
Manzi said that while any conviction will never make the victim’s family whole, he hopes that this will “close a chapter in this tragedy and they can move forward.” He also praised the teamwork of the state police, county coroner Jerry Overman, Jr., Citizens Ambulance and other officials in the investigation.
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