Man serving life sentence for raping daughter, killing two babies dies

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) - A man serving life in prison for raping his daughter and killing two babies he fathered with her has died in a Pennsylvania hospital.

Mendum Paul Corvin, 66, died of a heart attack Aug. 14 while serving three concurrent life sentences, The Palm Beach Post reported Monday.

Corvin pleaded no contest in August 1997 to a first-degree murder charge after police found remains of an infant in the coal cellar of his former home in Scottdale, Pa., near Pittsburgh. The newborn girl was killed in 1970 or 1971.

In November 1997, Corvin pleaded guilty to killing another child he fathered with his daughter and burying the newborn in the yard of the family's Florida home in Boynton Beach in 1968.

At the time of the plea bargains, Corvin had said he wanted to avoid a trial so he could spare his now-grown daughter, Sharon Corvin Moore, the agony of testifying.

''I knew it was terrible, what I did, and I knew I had to get rid of the baby when it was born,'' Corvin had said in a confession he later challenged.

Police began investigating the old murders after Moore's boyfriend went to police in April 1995 and told them about the baby buried in the back yard. Moore confirmed the story and led detectives to the skeletal remains of the two infants.

Corvin, a retired electrician, had been ill over the past several years and had suffered several heart attacks.