50-year grudge leads to S.D. killing, life prison term

(CBS/AP) MADISON, S.D. - Fifty years is a long time to carry a grudge - now 73-year-old South Dakota man Carl Ericsson will be carrying his grudge to prison, after admitting he recently killed a man who embarrassed him way back in high school, in the 1950s.  

Ericsson was given a life sentence on Friday, CBS affiliate KELO-TV reported.

The Watertown, S.D. man pleaded guilty but mentally ill to fatally shooting his former classmate, Norman Johnson, in January of this year. Johnson was a retired high school teacher and track coach.

Why did Ericsson do it after all these years, and decades?

He says he couldn't let go of an incident in which Johnson placed a jock strap on his head when Ericsson was the student manager of a high school sports team.

Before sentencing Friday, he apologized to Norman Johnson's widow and said that he wishes he could turn the clock back.

Johnson's daughter, Beth, says Carl Ericsson was always jealous of her father's success.