BOSTON, June 18, 2014—A Dorchester man was sentenced to life in prison yesterday after admitting that he stabbed 72-year-old Mary Miller to death in the Codman Hill Avenue apartment building where they were neighbors, Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel F. Conley said.

TU NGUYEN (D.O.B. 4/30/83) pleaded guilty late yesterday to second-degree murder for the 2012 homicide. Suffolk Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Locke sentenced him to the mandatory term of life in prison, followed by a 10-year term for burglary.

Had the case proceeded to trial, Assistant District Attorney David Fredette would have introduced evidence and testimony suggesting that Nguyen, who lived on the second floor of the building, gained access to Miller’s first-floor apartment through a window and stabbed her to death.

Boston Police responded to the scene at about 1:45 a.m. on Feb. 21, 2012, after a relative of the victim called 911 to report a breaking and entering. They found Miller mortally wounded and, in the course of their investigation, recovered a private security camera that appeared to show Nguyen entering the residence.

Nguyen was arrested in his apartment upstairs later that morning. He was initially committed to Bridgewater State Hospital but was later found competent to assist in his own defense.

Katherine Moran was the DA’s assigned victim-witness advocate.

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All defendants are presumed innocent until and unless proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.