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Ramona

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A Ramona man who beat his wife and girlfriend to death was sentenced Monday to 30 years to life in state prison.

Relatives of both victims urged the judge to impose the maximum sentence on Russell Klein, 38. Klein pleaded guilty Nov. 9 to second-degree murder in the 1983 deaths of Susan Klein, 36, and Ann Milyard, 37.

San Diego Superior Court Judge J. Richard Haden imposed two 15-years-to-life terms and ordered that they run consecutively.

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“These killings were approximately a month apart,” Haden said. “There is substantial evidence that each of these victims had been brutalized in the past.

“There was cruelty, viciousness and callousness.”

Susan Klein’s body had been burned, and investigators found only 13 pieces of charred bone on Klein’s property, a 13-acre parcel on Magnolia Avenue.

Klein’s son Seth, now 19, led investigators to the remains of both women in April.

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