GOSHEN — John T. Hawley will serve 65 years, the maximum sentence for murdering Kiran “Ken” Patel, the man who took Hawley off the streets and gave him a chance.

“You do not deserve to breathe the air in this room,” 19-year-old Shiv Patel told his father’s killer Wednesday morning in the courtroom at the Elkhart County Jail.

He asked for the maximum sentence on behalf of his whole family. “My dad won’t see me graduate from college or get married. My dad will never hold a child of mine,” Patel told Hawley. It was his younger brother who found their father’s beaten body inside the old Goshen Inn on Lincolnway East on Oct. 20.

Their mother, Karuna, was too emotional to speak, but had a letter read aloud. “My husband was a loving, caring, smart, hard-working person,” she wrote.

“My Kiran was a kind of person who cared 100 percent for any creature he came across,” she continued. After his murder, she wrote, “all that is left is nothing but sorrow, sadness and silence.”

When Hawley got his chance to speak, he told Shiv Patel, “Your dad was a good man.” Hawley said that when two other men suggested they rob their employer, who put them up while he had them work on renovations to the inn, “I never should’ve gone with it.”

Hawley said, though, “I don’t think the three hits I gave the man were severe enough to kill the man.”

He said he only pleaded guilty to murder to avoid another 30 years he could’ve received if prosecutors got him declared a habitual criminal.

“The murderer of your father is still loose,” Hawley said to Shiv Patel. He identified two men to Elkhart Circuit Judge Terry Shewmaker who Hawley said were working with him to rob Patel that day.

He told the judge that he didn’t know that either man inflicted any blows and admitted to using a hammer to strike his three blows to Patel’s head. Still, he said, “When I left Mr. Patel he was alive and with those two men.”

Chief Deputy Prosecutor Vicki Becker said the Goshen Police Department did a thorough investigation and that the two men identified by Hawley cooperated with police. “There’s absolutely no credible evidence to suggest another person was involved,” including blood-spatter evidence, she said.

Shiv Patel said, “My dad had a very big heart and wanted to help everybody” and didn’t see evil, he said.

“You had a place to work, Mr. Hawley. You received free food and drinks,” staying in the old Goshen Inn and working for Patel to renovate it. “He probably treated you better than anyone probably did in your life,” the younger Patel told Hawley.

In deciding on the maximum sentence, Shewmaker pointed out Hawley’s criminal history — including 16 arrests in five states. “At this point you could be placed in the category of old enough to know better,” Shewmaker told the 54-year-old man.

“The victim gave you a job, made arrangements to provide you with food, clothing, and shelter,” Shewmaker told Hawley.

Shewmaker ordered addictions and mental-health treatment for Hawley while he’s in prison at the request of Hawley’s attorney, Cliff Williams.

Williams said of his client, “In a different place, in a different time when sober, if these issues are addressed, there is humanity in this person.”

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