{"id":331587,"date":"2010-02-17T15:23:49","date_gmt":"2010-02-17T20:23:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chicagopressrelease.com\/press-releases\/third-defendant-in-haigh-murders-pleads-guilty-for-30-years-in-prison"},"modified":"2010-02-17T15:23:49","modified_gmt":"2010-02-17T20:23:49","slug":"third-defendant-in-haigh-murders-pleads-guilty-for-30-years-in-prison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/331587","title":{"rendered":"Third defendant in Haigh murders pleads guilty for 30 years in prison"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><p>\n\tURBANA \u2014 The oldest of a trio who murdered a Champaign couple in their home more than three years ago has been sentenced to 30 years in prison.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tRussell Pitcher, 52, pleaded guilty Wednesday morning before Champaign County Judge Heidi Ladd to the July 1, 2006, first-degree murder of Jerry Haigh.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tPitcher was serving a prison sentence in Iowa for sexual exploitation of a minor when he was charged in February 2009 with murders of Mr. Haigh, 58, and his wife, Sue Haigh, 66.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tOn July 4, 2006, the Haighs were found fatally beaten and stabbed in their home in the 1700 block of Scottsdale Drive. Their murders went unsolved for more than a year until co-defendant Crystal Myrick 32, implicated herself, her former boyfriend Kenneth Sean Kelly, 37, and Pitcher in the brutal slayings.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tKelly pleaded guilty first to Jerry Haigh\u2019s murder in August 2008 and was subsequently sentenced to 50 years in prison. Myrick was tried for the murders in October 2009 and convicted of both. Ladd sentenced her to natural life in prison.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tAt Myrick\u2019s trial, Pitcher testified that all three of them went to the Haigh home on July 1, intent on robbing the couple. Kelly claimed to have known the couple and believed that they kept money in their house.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tWhile all three defendants gave differing versions of how the murders were carried out, it was clear\u00a0 all three were present. And all three admitted they participated in mopping up the bloody scene with bleach and other cleaning fluids that stymied Champaign police in their efforts to gather physical evidence.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tBut for Myrick\u2019s own admissions after her conviction and eight-year prison sentence for residential arson in 2007, the murders might still be unsolved.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tBecause of Pitcher\u2019s willingness to testify at Myrick\u2019s trial \u2014 he admitted he twice cut Mr. Haigh\u2019s throat \u2014 Assistant State\u2019s Attorney Troy Lozar offered him the plea to 30 years. He will have to serve 100 percent of that sentence.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tUrbana attorney Tom Koester was appointed to represent Pitcher.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Distributed via <a href=\"http:\/\/chicagopressrelease.com\" rel='nofollow'>Chicago Press Release Services<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/WY8uqcmhwsPp2obemYCZ1siV6ns\/0\/da\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/WY8uqcmhwsPp2obemYCZ1siV6ns\/0\/di\" border=\"0\" ismap=\"true\"><\/img><\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/WY8uqcmhwsPp2obemYCZ1siV6ns\/1\/da\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/WY8uqcmhwsPp2obemYCZ1siV6ns\/1\/di\" border=\"0\" ismap=\"true\"><\/img><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"feedflare\">\n<a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.chicagopressrelease.com\/~ff\/windycitynews?a=kaBlalkGz9U:lvn55pqBMZc:yIl2AUoC8zA\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/windycitynews?d=yIl2AUoC8zA\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.chicagopressrelease.com\/~ff\/windycitynews?a=kaBlalkGz9U:lvn55pqBMZc:qj6IDK7rITs\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/windycitynews?d=qj6IDK7rITs\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.chicagopressrelease.com\/~ff\/windycitynews?a=kaBlalkGz9U:lvn55pqBMZc:V_sGLiPBpWU\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/windycitynews?i=kaBlalkGz9U:lvn55pqBMZc:V_sGLiPBpWU\" border=\"0\"><\/img><\/a>\n<\/div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~r\/windycitynews\/~4\/kaBlalkGz9U\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>URBANA \u2014 The oldest of a trio who murdered a Champaign couple in their home more than three years ago has been sentenced to 30 years in prison. Russell Pitcher, 52, pleaded guilty Wednesday morning before Champaign County Judge Heidi Ladd to the July 1, 2006, first-degree murder of Jerry Haigh. Pitcher was serving a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-331587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331587\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}