Aaron McKinney instead will spend the rest of his life in prison with no hope of parole thanks to a deal finalized Thursday with key input from Shepard's family. In return, McKinney has promised not to appeal his felony murder and kidnapping convictions and sentence.

``I would like nothing better than to see you die, Mr. McKinney. However this is the time to begin the healing process,'' Dennis Shepard said in court. ``To show mercy to someone who refused to show any mercy. To use this as the first step in my own closure about losing Matt.''

Prosecutor Cal Rerucha said he could have won a death sentence despite McKinney's acquittal of premeditated murder. The jury Wednesday convicted him of felony murder, also a capital offense.

He said Shepard's mother, Judy, wanted it known that ``Matthew stood for something and that something was tolerance, a tolerance of people.

``And she told me at this point in the proceedings that it would be wrong if our motives were revenge instead of justice,'' Rerucha said.

McKinney, a high school dropout and drug dealer, was the second defendant in Shepard's slaying to get life in prison. Russell Henderson, 22, pleaded guilty to murder earlier this year.

McKinney was convicted of murder, aggravated robbery and kidnapping for luring Shepard from a Laramie bar, robbing him of $20, lashing him to a fence and cracking his skull with blows from a pistol. Investigators said robbery was the main motive, but that McKinney and Henderson singled out the slightly built Shepard because he was gay.

The brutal crime galvanized gay-rights activists across the country and boosted the push for a federal law making it a crime to single out victims because of their sexual orientation.

Dennis Shepard on Thursday called on Congress to pass the Hate Crimes Prevention Act ``in memory of our son Matthew and all the other victims of crimes motivated by hate.''

McKinney's attorneys had been expected during the sentencing to revive the ``gay panic'' defense, used in other cases to explain violence toward a homosexual victim. They said McKinney was the victim of a homosexual assault when he was a boy, and he snapped when Shepard allegedly made a sexual advance.

District Judge Barton Voigt barred the strategy at trial, ruling that it was similar to temporary insanity or a diminished-capacity defense -- both prohibited under Wyoming law.

The rules in a sentencing hearing are different, though, and the defense would have had more leeway in presenting evidence.

But instead of seeking mercy from the jury, defense attorneys contacted the Shepards on Wednesday to make an offer.

McKinney spoke briefly during the sentencing: ``I really don't know what to say other than that I'm truly sorry to the entire Shepard family. Never will a day go by I won't be ashamed for what I have done.''