CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — A Vermont man who was just 17 at the time when he and an accomplice murdered a couple of Dartmouth College professors is now petitioning for his life sentence to be adjusted to a term of 30 to 40 years.
Robert Tulloch, who is now 43 years old, was handed an automatic life sentence without the possibility of parole after admitting to the first-degree murders of Half and Susanne Zantop in a 2001 stabbing incident. However, in 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court declared that mandatory life without parole for juveniles is unconstitutional, later applying this ruling retroactively.
This ruling opened a door to potential freedom for numerous individuals sentenced as juveniles, including five men in New Hampshire who were given life sentences for crimes they committed in their teenage years. Among them, Tulloch is the last to undergo a resentencing hearing, which is set to commence on Monday at Grafton County Superior Court.
The prosecution has yet to announce the sentence they will advocate for. Nevertheless, in a recent court document, Tulloch’s legal team has suggested a new minimum sentence ranging from 30 to 40 years. This recommendation was made after reviewing the outcomes of similar cases involving juvenile offenders in New Hampshire and across the nation following the landmark Supreme Court decisions.
Attorneys Richard Guerriero and Oliver Bloom further highlighted Tulloch’s growth during his imprisonment. They pointed out that except for some early misconduct, Tulloch has maintained a clean record, with no major violations since 2012 and no minor ones since 2017. His most frequent infractions were for having excessive books, they noted.
Quoting from Tulloch’s therapy records, they said he has expressed “significant remorse” for what he sees as a heinous and unforgivable crime, his “warped youthful thinking,” and his “good capacity for empathy.”
According to Tulloch’s friend, James Parker, the teens were bored with their lives in Chelsea, Vermont, when they concocted a plan to kill strangers, steal their money and move to Australia. For several months, they knocked on doors in New Hampshire and Vermont pretending to be conducting a survey on the environment before being let in by the Zantops. Susanne Zantop, 55, was head of Dartmouth’s German studies department and her husband, Half Zantop, 62, taught Earth sciences.
Parker, who was 16 at the time, told prosecutors that Tulloch stabbed Half Zantop and then directed Parker to attack Susanne Zantop. Tulloch also stabbed her. Fingerprints on a knife sheath and a bloody boot print linked the teens to the crime, but after being questioned by police, they fled Vermont and hitchhiked west. They were arrested at an Indiana truck stop weeks later.
Parker, who cooperated with prosecutors and pleaded guilty to being an accomplice to second-degree murder, was released from prison on parole in 2024 at age 40, having served nearly the minimum term of his 25-years-to-life sentence.
“I think it’s unimaginably horrible,” Parker said during his parole hearing when asked by a board member what he thought of what he did. “I know there’s not an amount of time or things that I can do to change it, or alleviate any pain that I’ve caused.”
The Supreme Court rulings addressed only mandatory life sentences without parole for juveniles, leaving the U.S. the only country that allows discretionary life sentences for minors. Twenty-eight states and the District of Columbia have banned the practice, while another five states allow it but have no one serving such a sentence, according to the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth.
New Hampshire lawmakers have rejected attempts to end life sentences for juveniles, but Tulloch’s case could bolster future attempts. After Tulloch argued in 2018 that sentencing juveniles to life without parole violated the state constitution, the judge asked the state Supreme Court to weigh in, but it declined. Last July, Superior Court Judge Lawrence MacLeod agreed with Tulloch, finding that the constitution categorically prohibits such sentences as “cruel or unusual” punishment.
Among the juvenile lifers nationwide who have been resentenced after the U.S. Supreme Court rulings, more than 75% have received sentences of less than 40 years, according to a study published in 2024 in the Journal of Criminal Justice.
In New Hampshire, one man was resentenced to life without parole after refusing to attend his hearing or authorize his attorneys to argue for a lesser sentence. Others received sentences of 25-, 40- and 45-years-to-life.