SPOKANE – A woman charged with arranging to have a man killed because she believed he had stolen a Beatles poster he once gave her has been acquitted of first-degree murder.
Kathryn B. Kelly, 31, of Spokane Valley, burst into tears, covered her wide smile with both hands and whispered, “Thank you so much,” to the Spokane County Superior Court jury as the verdict was announced Thursday.
After 14 months in jail, Kelly turned to her family and mouthed, “I want to go home.”
Deputy Prosecutor Stephen Garvin was visibly upset and declined to comment.
The case stemmed from the killing of Robert “Bud” Johnson, 45, whose body was pulled from the Spokane River on March 18, 2006.
Kelly’s cousin, Robert A. Entel, 19, agreed to testify against her and Donald L. Smiley-Lyle, 18, and to plead guilty in a deal with prosecutors that would spare him life in prison without parole. Instead, Entel agreed to accept a 25-year prison term. Smiley-Lyle’s trial is set for July 9.
Prosecutors said Kelly was homeless and broke before Johnson let her move in with him and had a brief romantic relationship with her, giving her a framed Beatles poster with a celebrity autograph as a Valentine’s Day present in February 2006.
But the relationship cooled, and soon afterward he asked her to return the poster so he could sell it on eBay. She refused, and the poster was taken in a burglary the next month at Entel’s home, where she had moved in. Entel reportedly saw Johnson and a friend driving away.
Within days, Johnson was reported missing. According to court records, Entel told police that he and Smiley-Lyle gagged Johnson, tied his hands, strangled him and banged his head on the floor before driving him to the Spokane River and throwing him in.
Kelly denied asking Entel and Smylie-Lyle to kill Johnson, but Garvin argued that according to witnesses, she talked about wanting Johnson dead, provided a key to his room and told Entel and Smiley-Lyle where to park and the quietest way to enter, Garvin said.
Defense lawyer Richard Sanger countered that the only hard evidence in the case pointed to Entel and Smylie-Lyle as the killers.
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