BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — A Montana judge has rejected a more lenient plea deal and given a four-year prison sentence to the stepmother of three children taken to the Bahamas on a sailboat against custody orders.
Angela Bryant, 45, had pleaded guilty in May under a deal with prosecutors that called for her to get only six months prison.
But the Gallatin County Clerk of District Court said Monday that Judge Michael Salvagni instead imposed a four-year term. That matches the sentence given to the children's father, James Bryant, in July.
The children were supposed to be returned to their mother in Montana last September under a court-ordered custody plan. They were missing for more than seven months when authorities found them with the Bryants on a sailboat off the Florida coast.
