Charles Severance is wheeled into the courtroom at the Fairfax County Circuit Court in Fairfax, Va., for his sentencing.

Jan. 21, 2016 Charles Severance is wheeled into the courtroom at the Fairfax County Circuit Court in Fairfax, Va., for his sentencing. Jahi Chikwendiu/The Washington Post

Charles Severance, who was found guilty of fatally shooting three people between 2003 and 2014, is sentenced to life in prison.

Charles Severance, who was found guilty of fatally shooting three people between 2003 and 2014, is sentenced to life in prison.

Charles Severance, who was found guilty of fatally shooting three people between 2003 and 2014, is sentenced to life in prison.

Given a last opportunity to speak before he was sentenced to life in prison, convicted serial killer Charles Severance rambled. He cited the Book of Common Prayer, Henry VIII, “Elizabeth” and “the 37th article of religion.”

“It is lawful to wear weapons,” he concluded. Then he went silent.

Unmoved, a Fairfax County Circuit Court judge imposed a punishment of three life terms plus 48 years. The result was not a surprise: Jurors had recommended the sentence last year after finding Severance guilty of murder in three slayings in Alexandria over the course of nearly a decade. But that didn’t lessen the emotional impact of Thursday’s hearing.

Choking back tears, Judge Randy I. Bellows talked at length about the victims’ family members and the horror they endured because of Severance’s crimes. A few of them cried and hugged in the gallery.

“He condemned each of these family members to bear witness to a nightmare,” Bellows said.

Fairfax County Circuit Court judge has sentenced convicted serial killer Charles Severance to three life sentences, with an additional 48 years, in the murder of three Alexandria residents over the course of a decade. (Ashleigh Joplin/The Washington Post)

[Charles Severance is found guilty of murder]

Severance, 55, was convicted in November in the fatal shootings of music teacher Ruthanne Lodato in February 2014, regional transportation planner Ronald Kirby in November 2013 and real estate agent Nancy Dunning in December 2003. Prosecutors said bitterness over a child-custody battle he lost and a general hatred of Alexandria’s elite motivated him to shoot the victims — all apparently strangers to him — in daylight attacks at their homes.

At the hearing Thursday, Alexandria Commonwealth’s Attorney Bryan Porter said Severance was driven by the same “anger and hatred and proclivity for violence” that fuels mass shootings. He contrasted the good that was done by the victims with that rage, noting that Severance would soon be transported to a maximum-security prison and spend the rest of his life “wallowing in the anger and loathing that mark his time on Earth.”

“Violence does not win,” Porter said. “In the end, flying in the face of the senseless violence [and] despair that has been exhibited in this case, it is an incontrovertible fact that love wins.”

[What Charles Severance wrote to a Washington Post reporter]

Severance said nothing to address the crimes of which he was convicted, although he spoke at length on other matters. Immediately after sheriff’s deputies brought him into the courtroom in a wheelchair, Severance leaned into the microphone and said “sadism, sadism.” He tried to have his attorneys removed — even seeking “a protection order against them for my safety.”

“I don’t want to be represented by people who make statements against my interests,” he said. “It’s unusual punishment.”

Severance also complained that the sentencing had been moved from Friday to Thursday, which the judge said was done in anticipation of a weekend snowstorm, and asked for it to be postponed.

Bellows rejected Severance’s requests, although he did agree to appoint lawyer James Hundley to represent Severance on appeal, noting that his current attorneys had asked to be removed because of a communication breakdown between them and their client. Defense attorney Christopher Leibig declined to comment after the hearing. He said during the sentencing that Severance had significant, undiagnosed mental health problems and was not truly evil.

Family members of each victim and Severance’s parents were in court for the hearing. Notably, so was former Virginia governor Robert F. McDonnell, who graduated from high school with Lodato’s husband; and state Attorney General Mark R. Herring. Two attorneys from Herring’s office assisted Porter and Senior Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney David Lord in prosecuting the case.

A Lodato family neighbor, John Kelly, who has been in touch with relatives of the other victims and has been serving as a spokesman of sorts for the Lodatos, said: “I think the families want to move on, as they always have.”

Herring praised the prosecutors for doing “excellent work” and said Severance’s crimes “shattered the sense of peace and security that folks here have.”

Last year, Severance’s trial was moved from Alexandria to Fairfax County over concerns about seating an impartial jury.

Porter said Severance had “been held accountable and exposed for what he really is — a clever but cowardly murderer.” He also urged legislators to consider gun-control reform, including background checks for those who purchase weapons from gun shows. He said Severance’s case could have been prevented if someone close to him had reported his anger to authorities earlier or if a girlfriend had not purchased a gun for him.

Severance’s behavior in court was not unexpected. Throughout the legal proceedings, he frequently sparred with judges. During the trial, jurors learned that he was a peculiar man who at times seemed to battle psychological demons and at other times appeared to lead a normal life. The son of a two-star admiral, Severance lived in various places during his youth and enjoyed traveling, history and gaming. He attended three colleges, ultimately graduating with a degree in mechanical engineering from the University of Virginia, and he was briefly married. In recent years, he went weekly to his parents’ house to watch the TV show “Survivor.”

Family members said Severance was vigorously opposed to smoking, even confronting his parents’ guests about it when they came for dinner. When he campaigned for political office in Alexandria in 1996 and 2000, a part of his platform was to encourage “country dancing” in the school system. When he wrote to his family members, the missives were often rambling and nonsensical. He wrote a similar letter to two Washington Post reporters after his conviction. An expert testified that he had a personality disorder with mixed paranoid and schizotypal features.