Life in Prison for Man Convicted of 2007 Murder of St. Charles Insurance Agent

Paul White, formerly of St. Charles, was given a life sentence without parole on Monday for the 2007 murder of 48-year-old insurance agent Robert Eidman.

White received another life sentence for a second count of robbery. The sentences will run consecutively.

In early June 2007, White, broke after a gambling loss of $1,200, planned to rob Eidman, a St. Peters resident, when he recalled that Eidman, who was his wife's insurance agent, took cash payments. Although White's roommate, Cleo Hines, pulled the trigger, Eidman planned the crime and provided the gun, prosecutors said.

The case was unsolved for more than three years when DNA evidence finally connected White, incarcerated for another crime, to the murder. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported on White's trial and the resulting the guilty verdict on Aug. 3.

Before the sentencing, Circuit Court Judge Lucy Rauch denied a motion by the defendent for a new trial. Several of Eidman's family made victim impact statements, including his wife of 32 years, Diane Eidman.

"They say that in time, it will get better, but it doesn't," she said. "Just different. You have no one to share things with, no one to fight and make up with. No one to make plans with. You are alone."

Glen Eidman, the brother of the victim, said that White had shown no remorse for his actions.

"The only remorse he showed was that he was caught," he said.

Hines, pleaded guilty to robbery and second-degree murder and is scheduled for sentencing on Oct. 29.