Colin Abbott

The latest appeal by convicted killer Colin Abbott was denied Tuesday by the state’s Supreme Court.

Abbott, a 43-year-old New Jersey man, is serving 35 to 80 years in a state prison for killing his father and stepmother in the summer of 2011.

Prosecutors believe Abbott shot Kenneth Abbott, 65, and Celeste Abbott, 55, as part of a plan to erase $2 million in debt to his father and to inherit the couple’s $4 million estate. Investigators found the couple’s remains burned and scattered on their 25-acre homestead in Brady Township.

In exchange for Abbott’s plea of no contest to two counts of third-degree murder, the Butler County District Attorney’s office dropped its intent to seek the death penalty.

But within days of being sentenced, Abbott began a pursuit to back out of the deal and seek a trial.

Claiming he was under duress and not working well with his then-defense attorney Wendy Williams of Pittsburgh, Abbott already unsuccessfully appealed to county Judge William Shaffer and the state Superior Court.

Shaffer denied Abbott’s request, asserting that his “demeanor and lucidity” during the plea hearings belied his claim that he was under extreme duress. Further, Shaffer wrote that even if all of Abbott’s claims were true, they still wouldn’t hit manifest injustice, the standard to which a new trial would be merited.

A three-judge panel of the state Superior Court later affirmed Shaffer’s decision, noting that prosecutors in the county district attorney’s office had presented as evidence a compact disc containing nine recorded telephone calls made of Abbott from prison during which Abbott “and his mother discussed ways to garner publicity and to create judicial chaos by filing the motion to withdraw his plea. These additional statements further belie (Abbott’s) assertion on manifest injustice.”

Then in December 2013, Abbott asked the state Supreme Court to hear his argument. In an order that gives no explanation, the court Tuesday refused the request.

“I’m extremely pleased the court denied his petition,” Assistant District Attorney Ben Simon, who prosecuted the case, said Wednesday.

Abbott’s defense attorney, public defender Joseph Smith, said Abbott now has exhausted all of his direct appeals.

Smith on Wednesday said he had yet to contact Abbott, who has one year to file a post conviction relief act, a different type of appeal that only can raise a limited number of issues, including ineffective counsel and discovery of new evidence.

“Given the nature of the case, this likely will occur in the near future,” said Smith.

While the direct appeals have been in motion, the status of Kenneth Abbott’s estate had been in a holding pattern.

Colin Abbott had been named his father’s largest heir. But attorneys representing the state have asked the courts to apply the state’s Slayer’s Act and forbid him from inheriting any money.

Butler attorney Tom King, who represents the estate, declined to comment when contacted Wednesday. Colin Abbott’s civil attorney, H. Craig Hinkle, could not immediately be reached.