 At the sentencing hearing, Knight's lawyers requested that she be excused to avoid hearing some of the facts, but the application was refused.When Timothy Lyons took the stand and described the skinning and decapitation, Knight became hysterical and had to be sedated.On 8 November, Justice O'Keefe pointed out that the nature of the crime and Knight's lack of remorse required a severe penalty; he sentenced her to life imprisonment, refused to fix a non-parole period and ordered that her papers be marked "never to be released", the first time that this had been imposed on a woman in Australian history.