Man sentenced to 30 months after botched exorcism ends in death of autistic boy

(RNS) A man who performed a fatal exorcism on an 8-year-old autistic boy was sentenced to 30 months in prison Aug. 17 and ordered not to do any more exorcisms by a judge in Milwaukee.

Ray Hemphill was charged with lying on the chest of Terrance Cottrell, Jr. while trying to expel “demons” during a ceremony at a storefront church on Aug. 22, 2003, according to the Associated Press.

Three women, including Cottrell’s mother, Patricia Cooper, held the boy down while Hemphill lay on top of him in the botched ritual. “He would still be here today if I never would have taken him to that church,” Cooper said after the trial.

Hemphill was convicted of physical abuse of a child recklessly causing great bodily harm by a jury last month. His lawyers argued the boy died of an overdose of medication; an autopsy ruled he died by suffocation.