SPOKANE, Wash. — A Spokane couple who killed their daughter's ex-boyfriend and left his body in a car trunk for a year pleaded guilty in court Thursday.
John Eisenman and his fiancé Brenda Kross told the Spokane County judge they are guilty of killing the 19-year-old. Out of respect for the teen's family, we are not sharing his name or image.
Thursday afternoon, Eisenman pleaded guilty to first-degree murder. Kross pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter, which is a charge prosecutors reduced from first-degree murder.
Court documents say at the time of his arrest in 2020, Eisenman admitted to killing the teen, who he claimed sold his daughter into a sex trafficking organization. But Spokane police found no evidence that the victim participated in sex trafficking his ex-girlfriend.
Eisenman told police he kidnapped the teen in Airway Heights, zip-tied his wrists and beat him over the head with a cinder block. The body was kept in the trunk of a car for a year before it was discovered in Hillyard. Police arrested Eisenman after tracing the car back to him.
A year after his arrest, police arrested Eisenman's fiancé, Kross for her involvement in the teen's murder. Court documents say she admitted to a co-worker she helped kill the teen.
Before accepting her guilty plea, the judge read Kross's statement of guilt. It acknowledges there was no evidence of sex trafficking.
The couple faces a maximum sentence of life in prison. But as part of their plea deal, prosecutors will recommend 22 years for Eisenman, which is the low end of the standard range for murder. And, they will recommend eight years in prison and three years of community custody for Kross.
The teen's family was in the courtroom for the plea hearings. They are not ready to speak publicly at this time. But we do expect to hear their victim impact statements at the couple's sentence hearing in January next year.