North Carolina lottery winner gets life in prison for 2020 murder of his girlfriend

A lottery winner from North Carolina will spend the rest of his life behind bars for fatally shooting his girlfriend in 2020.

Michael Todd Hill, at the time a nuclear plant worker, took home the $10 million jackpot in 2017, according to WCET. He was arrested just three years later and charged with first-degree murder in the slaying of his girlfriend, Keonna Graham. Police also charged him with possession of a firearm by a felon.

Graham was initially reported missing by her mother in July 2020, and her body was later found in the SureStay Hotel in Shallotte. According to authorities, the 23-year-old victim was fatally shot in the head while she was laying in a hotel bed.

Michael Todd Hill

The manager of the hotel, Vee Patel, said Hill checked into the room alone before a housekeeper found Graham’s body. What’s more, surveillance footage also shows that Hill was only person to ever be in the room with his girlfriend, according to a press release from the 15th Prosecutorial District of North Carolina.

Police said Hill later confessed to the murder after he discovered texts on her phone from other men. He noted that they’d been in a romantic relationship for a year and a half after he won his lottery prize on a scratch-off ticket.

Jurors deliberated for about an hour on Friday before agreeing to convict Hill on both charges. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the murder charge and a concurrent 22 to 36 months for possession of a firearm by felon.

With News Wire Services