A packed courtroom strained to hear Matthew Niedere's low, unemotional tones Monday as he described how he and a friend repeatedly shot Niedere's parents in their Hastings business. The friend, Clayton Keister, 17, broke down in tears as he described his role in the double murder of the respected couple Oct. 8. "I liked them," he replied in a choked voice when a prosecutor asked how he felt about the couple, whose home he had visited a handful of times.

Keister said he fired a shotgun at Patricia Niedere at her son's urging, after Matt had wounded her and killed his father, Peter Niedere. New details about the shootings came out Monday as each teenager pleaded guilty to two counts of aiding first-degree murder while attempting to commit aggravated robbery, one for each victim.

The plea agreements called for them to serve two concurrent sentences of at least 30 years before they are eligible for parole.

Dakota County Attorney James Backstrom noted other murder charges will be dropped when the teens are sentenced March 15, including a premeditated murder charge that requires a sentence of life without parole.

Backstrom said that he agreed to the pleas after talking with Matt Niedere's brother and sister-in-law, Dan and Angela Niedere, as well as Patricia Niedere's mother and other relatives. Some family members think the sentences are not long enough, while others think they are about right, said Pat Cahill, Matt's uncle.

"There are a lot of mixed feelings among the family," Cahill said. He said that most are probably happy that the case will not drag on, and that the family has respected the prosecutors' decisions. Dan and Angela Niedere, who attended the plea hearing, won't have a comment until the sentencing, said Angela's mother, Debbie Engeldinger. She said the couple are still grieving the loss of Dan's parents.

'I was angry at them'

Matt Niedere, 18, wearing handcuffs and a tan jail jumpsuit, testified Monday that he shot his father numerous times and his mother several times until his semiautomatic pistol ran out of bullets. "If there were more bullets would you have fired again?" Backstrom asked. "Yes," Niedere replied quietly. When his attorney, Sharon Freiling, asked what the purpose of the murder plot was, Niedere replied: "I was angry at them. I don't know." Keister testified that Niedere had issues with his parents since at least March 2005, when he confided in Keister while they were on spring break in Las Vegas. Keister said they planned the murders for two weeks, either whispering in the back of their physics class at Concordia Academy in Roseville, or at Central Park, about a mile away. He said that a third teenager, Jamie Patton, 18, joined the plotting and that Niedere offered them each about $15,000.

Murder conspiracy charges are pending against Patton.

Keister testified that on Saturday, Oct. 8, he carried a semiautomatic pistol when he followed Niedere into his parents' auto glass and shoe store on Hastings' main street. A concerned Patricia Niedere said they shouldn't play around with guns, so Keister told her it was a pellet gun, he said.

A change of heart

She offered him some pizza, and they chatted. Then Keister said he told Matt privately he couldn't do it and went outside to Matt's car. Keister heard about five shots, then Matt's mother, wounded in the arm, came outside, asked what's wrong with Matt and said to call 911. He said he told her "to run, get away," but she returned to the shop, and he heard more shots. Then Matt came out and told Keister to get a shotgun from the car and finish his mother. Keister said he went in with the gun and saw Patricia Niedere lying on the floor, her chest heaving. He said he thought she was dead or nearly dead. "I shut my eyes and shot," he said. However, prosecutors said that the shots Matt Niedere inflicted on his mother wouldn't have killed her.

The evidence indicated that Patricia Niedere was trying to drag her husband out a side door when Keister shot her in the back of the head, causing instant death, Backstrom said. "Patty could easily have kept running and saved herself at that time, but she returned inside the store in a heroic attempt to save her dying husband," Backstrom said. Keister also described an initial murder attempt the night of Oct. 7, when Matt was out bowling and he and Patton drove to the Niederes' home to kill the couple. But as Keister was ready to break in the back patio door with a glass cutter, a motion sensor went off and an alarm sounded, causing the pair to flee, Keister testified. He said he called Matt as they drove away and Patton yelled at Matt for not telling them about the alarm. Patton refused Matt's request to return that night or the next day, but Keister drove back to Hastings to meet Niedere about 1 p.m. on Oct. 8.

A debate over motives

When Keister's attorney, Dan Guerrero, asked why he was involved, Keister said it wasn't for the money that Matt offered, but because Matt threatened to kill Keister's family if Keister backed out. "The reason why I couldn't stop myself was because I thought - obviously I thought Matt was serious - I didn't want to see my family get hurt," Keister testified, his voice choking. Keister, of Blaine, said Niedere had gone through his parents' will and claimed they were worth about $1.4 million. Backstrom asked Keister later why he hadn't told the Hastings police after his arrest of the supposed threats. "I was still terrified of Matt," he responded.

After the hearing, Backstrom offered his perception of why the murders happened. For Niedere, "the answer seems to lie in a mixture of a quest for freedom from parents he viewed as too strict and overbearing, combined with selfishness and greed," Backstrom said. For Keister, who liked playing paintball and provided the weapons, "the why seems to lie in a mixture of a warped sense of loyalty to some of the few close friends he apparently had, combined with the thrill of tactical role-playing and planning," Backstrom said. Drugs, alcohol and mental illness were not factors in the shootings, he said.

After the separate plea hearings, Judge Tim McManus said the two defendants will be held without bail. He added: "I have never been in a more painful proceeding in my entire life." Jo Boettcher, one of Patricia Niedere's friends, said she hopes the case will hit home with any other children who would ever contemplate a similar act. "We're hoping it's over," she said. "It's a story to you, and it's a story to others, but it's the life of everybody here."

Staff writer Tom Ford contributed to this report.