A Springfield man already serving decades in prison for murder has been sentenced to additional time for killing his cellmate at Pinckneyville Prison.
Thirty-eight-year-old Daniel Mueller, formerly of Springfield, was sentenced January 8 in Perry County Circuit Court to 18 additional years in the Illinois Department of Corrections for the 2018 strangulation death of his cellmate, Earl Little.
Prosecutors said Mueller killed 33-year-old Earl Little of Beardstown in July of 2018, allegedly using a cord from a fan inside the cell the two men shared. Little had entered the prison system just five months earlier and was serving a 21-year sentence for armed robbery and unlawful restraint involving a victim from Aurora.
Mueller entered an open plea to second-degree murder, resulting in the dismissal of three first-degree murder charges. At the time of the killing, Mueller was already serving a 30-year sentence for the 2012 strangulation murder of his girlfriend, Kayla Dillon, in Springfield.
Following Little’s death, his widow, Megan Little of Quincy, filed a federal lawsuit against Pinckneyville Prison Warden Scott Thompson, citing a lack of information provided to the family. That lawsuit was dismissed with prejudice in 2019.
Mueller’s projected parole date is December 14, 2051, with a projected discharge date of December 14, 2054, when he would be 67 years old.