Maine’s highest court has thrown out the 45-year prison sentence imposed on a Massachusetts man who pleaded guilty to the 2022 murder of a 20-year-old woman in Skowhegan.

In a decision issued Thursday, the justices of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court vacated Jason Servil’s sentence on the grounds that Superior Court Chief Justice Robert E. Mullen considered the obituary of the victim, Alice Abbott, in his sentencing analysis.

Servil, who remains incarcerated, will face a new sentencing hearing, which has not been scheduled.

Mullen, when discussing the three-step analysis used to determine a sentence, had asked Abbott’s family if he could read her obituary into the record to reflect the aggravating factor of victim impact. Mullen said he found the writeup “very moving.”

Mullen obtained the obituary on his own and did not provide it to Servil’s attorneys before the sentencing hearing in April 2024. Mullen also “appeared less than impartial” when asking Abbott’s family in the courtroom if he could read it out loud, the decision says.

“Accordingly, we conclude that the court abused its discretion by incorporating, and potentially giving weight to, information obtained from its own independent research, and we cannot say that this error was harmless,” Associate Justice Rick E. Lawrence wrote on behalf of the panel of justices.

The high court also ordered that a different judge preside over Servil’s new sentencing hearing.

The panel heard oral arguments in Portland in March.

Servil, now 22, was not appealing his conviction for the July 2022 murder of Abbott and the assault of Nick Rice, both in Skowhegan, as he pleaded guilty to both counts in January 2024.

Servil, of Boston, was arrested July 16, 2022, after Skowhegan police responded to a report of an assault at 912 Canaan Road.

Servil stabbed Abbott 99 times and attacked Rice with a crowbar, according to prosecutors. Servil and Abbott had a brief romantic relationship, and prosecutors said Abbott told him she wanted to end it. Servil later found Abbott and Rice together and attacked them.

When police located Servil, he admitted to the murder of Abbott and the assault of Rice.

Servil was sentenced in April 2024 in Skowhegan as part of a plea agreement in which prosecutors agreed to cap their requested sentence at 45 years. Abbott’s family objected to that deal during the sentencing hearing.

Mullen sentenced Servil to 45 years in prison for Abbott’s murder, with 10 years concurrent for the aggravated assault of Rice.

At the end of the sentencing hearing, Abbott’s brother, Clifford Warren, tried to attack Servil and was charged with assault. Prosecutors later declined to pursue the charge.

On appeal, Servil’s attorneys, Jeremy Pratt and Ellen Simmons, also took issue with Mullen’s reading of a psalm during the sentencing hearing, arguing it was a violation of Servil’s due process and First Amendment rights.

The law court disagreed, as Mullen read the psalm in closing remarks, having already imposed the sentence.

Servil’s attorneys also challenged Mullen’s determination that consecutive sentences for the murder and aggravated assault convictions were not permitted. Pratt had argued for consecutive sentences because that would have allowed for a period of probation on the aggravated assault conviction. In Maine, sentences for murder, which range from 25 years to life, are not allowed to include probation.

The law court disagreed with that point as well, saying Mullen did not make any error.

In all aspects of the appeal, the state, through the office of Maine Attorney General Aaron M. Frey, argued that any possible mistake on Mullen’s part at the time of sentencing was ultimately harmless.

As of Thursday, Servil was incarcerated at the Maine State Prison in Warren, according to Department of Corrections online records.