An Idaho teen faces life in prison when she is sentenced this week for the premeditated murders of her parents in September 2003.

Sarah Johnson, 18, will stand before her family and a judge in court for the first time since a Boise jury found her guilty in March of the shooting deaths of Diane and Alan Johnson in their quiet suburban home in Bellevue, Idaho.

The panel heard six weeks of testimony and deliberated for three days before convicting the high school volleyball player of two counts of first-degree murder for shooting her parents at point-blank range with a high-velocity rifle when she was 16 years old.

Testimony from members of her family will play a key role in the sentencing in Blaine County, just as it did at trial.

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In trial testimony, the defendant's older brother, aunts and uncles characterized the defendant as a selfish and greedy teen, and described her "bizarre" behavior after the murders that led them to suspect her.

Sarah Johnson's aunt, Linda Vavold, said she and other relatives had prepared victim impact statements to be read in open court.

"I think all of us would be really happy if she were sorry for what she did and if she would accept it. That would be great," said Vavold, the owner of a Christian bookstore near Boise and Diane Johnson's sister. "But I don't know if that's going to happen."

Blaine County prosecutors accused the 16-year-old of killing her parents because they disapproved of her romantic relationship with a 19-year-old undocumented Mexican immigrant and threatened to press charges against him.

Johnson's defense team stuck to her claims that she was awoken by the shootings and ran out of the house before she saw anything. They argued that, if she had been the shooter, investigators would have been able to produce stronger forensic evidence linking her to the bloody crime scene.

Police who responded to the scene at 6:30 a.m. found Diane Johnson still under the covers, dead from a single gunshot to the head. Alan Johnson was shot as he emerged from the shower and was still wet when he was discovered naked on the floor of his bedroom.

Sarah Johnson will return this week to the case's original jurisdiction in the hillside town of Hailey, Idaho. A judge moved the trial to the capital city of Boise, about three hours away, after roughly 75 percent of potential jurors were dismissed due to financial hardship or bias associated with pretrial publicity.

By Idaho law, Johnson will receive an automatic life sentence, but the judge has wide discretion in determining when, and whether, she will be eligible for parole. State law mandates at least 10 years in prison for first-degree murder before being eligible for parole, but Fifth District Judge Barry Wood could increase that minimum.

Wood once commented in open court that evidence linking Sarah Johnson to her parents' murders was as strong as "a 40-acre field of garlic in full bloom" as he rejected a post-conviction defense motion for acquittal.

The proceedings in Blaine County Court will be aired live on Court TV and streamed live on Court TV Extra.