2 Get Life Sentences in Missouri Murder-for-Hire Insurance Case

Two eastern Missouri men have been sentenced to life in federal prison for a murder-for-hire plot.

James Kornhardt and Steven Mueller were convicted in June in connection with the 1992 killing of Danny Harold Coleman.

Coleman’s wife, Karen, was sentenced last month to 20 years in prison. Prosecutors say she wanted her husband dead for the insurance money.

Danny Coleman was 38 when he was killed in his St. Louis home. His body was found in his burning pickup truck in Franklin County.

Kornhardt was a suburban St. Louis firefighter and Mueller was his friend. Investigators linked Kornhardt to the killing in 1999 after interviewing a prison inmate and matching Kornhardt’s fingerprints with those on a box of matches near the burning truck.