Yolanda Thompson And Husband Lured, Stabbed Teen; Dumped Body
UNION, S.C. -- A Union County woman who pleaded guilty to helping kill her husband's teenage girlfriend was sentenced to life in prison without parole on Friday.
Yolanda Thompson's sentence was handed down just before noon on Friday.
Yolanda Thompson addressed the judge during her murder sentencing.
Prosecutors said Thompson and her husband lured 16-year-old Union High School cheerleader Marisha Jeter to a parking lot in January 2008. The Thompsons beat Jeter to the ground, stabbed her multiple times, and then dumped the girl's body over a bridge and burned her car.
"I am not an awful person, but I did do an awful thing," Yolanda told the court. "I allowed myself to be in a vulnerable situation that escalated to something that I regret and I'm extremely sorry for."
Six people spoke to the court on behalf of Thompson, including her parents, her aunt and friends of the family. They all asked the judge for mercy.
"My actions have broken a lot of hearts and has caused a flow of many tears that I don't have the power to heal," Yolanda told the court.
Yolanda's attorney painted her as a loving, intelligent woman whose inability to have a normal relationship with a man came from ongoing abuse when she was a child.
"What you have emerging is someone with extraordinary intellectual capacity, strong work ethic and then a very stunted or impaired emotional development," said attorney Harry Dest.
Marisha Jeter's brother, uncle and father addressed the court.
"They talk about [Yolanda] being abused, but she wasn't stabbed 33 times and her throat was cut and then thrown into a river -- that's worse than abuse," said Manning Jeter, Marisha's father.
Jeter's relatives talked about the fact that the teen's mother could not be in court due to the toll the case has taken on her health.
"I would like to ask just everybody, just please, just pray for my family," Jeter told WYFF News4's Mike McCormick.
The Jeter family asked the judge not to have mercy on Yolanda. The judge called it a "tragedy for everyone" and then handed down the sentence of life without parole.
It's the same sentence Yolanda's husband, Pernell, is serving. He pleaded guilty to the murder in September and by doing so, avoided a trial and the possibility of the death penalty.
Yolanda Thompson pleaded guilty to the murder in March but she wasn't sentenced then because she was supposed to participate in the prosecution of her husband at his trial.
Jeter's father said he's pleased with the sentences.
"Neither one of them has gotten what I feel they deserve, but being put where they're being put, there's no way they're going to ever be able to hurt anybody else and that gives me a little bit of relief," said Jeter.
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