Ex-con with violent past arrested after GPS bracelet is cut

Published 1:30 am Monday, November 19, 2018

EVERETT — An ex-con who took part in the 2002 kidnapping of a Marysville teenager who was shot to death is back behind bars and stands accused of cutting the ankle bracelet used to monitor his whereabouts while on parole.

Jeff Barth spent years behind bars for standing by and doing nothing while others beat, kidnapped and eventually killed Rachel Burkheimer, 18, of Marysville. In 2013, he was convicted of second-degree domestic violence assault with a deadly weapon for a violent attack on his girlfriend. He again was sentenced to prison.

In that case, he was accused of holding a knife to his girlfriend’s throat after he slapped and choked her. She reported to police that he told her “you’re going to die today (expletive),” court papers said.

A community corrections officer confronted Barth in September after his GPS tracking device indicated he’d gone to a location he was prohibited from visiting. The officer reported that Barth hung up when he was asked about it and that the officer later recovered the cut bracelet.

Barth was arrested Oct. 31 while in a car in the 6000 block of McDougall Avenue in Everett. Inside the car, police found methamphetamine and fentanyl. “Several officers recognized the setup and amount of drugs as being consistent with possession with the intent to distribute,” prosecutors wrote in court papers.

Barth is being held on $100,000 bail in the Snohomish County Jail. Prosecutors wrote: “This defendant is both unlikely to voluntarily appear for future court hearings and also presents an unacceptable risk to the community.” He’s had 34 warrants issued for his arrest.

Barth was sentenced to nearly a decade in prison for his role in the Burkheimer case.

In 2002, the young woman was lured to a south Everett duplex, tied up and beaten. She was stuffed in a hockey bag and driven to east Snohomish County, where she was shot to death.

Barth was accused of doing nothing to help her. He also was accused of taunting the girl while she was tied up.

But Barth cut a deal with prosecutors, agreeing to testify against his former friends, including the shooter. For his cooperation and guilty plea, prosecutors dropped the murder charge against him.

Eric Stevick: 425-339-3446; stevick@heraldnet.com.