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VISTA, Calif. – A California woman has been convicted of first-degree murder in the death of her former stepfather after she discovered he was keeping nude pictures of her.
Jade Janks who works as an interior designer was accused of drugging and strangling her former stepfather after discovering nude photos of herself on his computer, according to prosecutors.
Janks, 39, shared a home with her one-time stepfather, Thomas Merriman, 64, in Solana Beach, California, a coastal community about 22 miles north of San Diego. Merriman was long divorced from Janks’ mother, but she still helped him out. His body was discovered under a pile of trash in a driveway near their home on South Nardo Avenue on January 2, 2021. Janks was subsequently charged with his death, reported The San Diego Union-Tribune.
The murder trial of Janks, an interior designer who also co-founded the research nonprofit Butterfly Farms, began earlier this month in Vista Superior Court, Law Officer reported.
Prosecutors said Jade Janks killed her former stepfather “by design.” (Facebook)
Prosecutors said that Janks drugged her former stepfather and strangled him to death for stealing and possessing nude images of her, according to the Union-Tribune.
San Diego County Deputy District Attorney Jorge Del Portillo said, “This was no accident. This was murder by design.”
The prosecutor said Merriman died New Year’s Eve 2020, within hours after Janks picked him up from a care facility where he had been rehabbing following a fall.
The nude pictures were taken with Janks’ consent more than a decade ago by her boyfriend at the time, authorities said. It’s unclear how Merriman obtained possession of them.
Janks discovered the revealing pics while she was cleaning her stepdad’s apartment during his hospitalization, Del Portillo noted.
According to Law&Crime, Janks testified that she discovered hundreds of pictures on her former stepfather’s computer. Some dated back to when she was in her late teens, and included revealing pictures she voluntarily took with an ex-boyfriend. Her guess was that Merriman stole the pictures from her laptop and from a missing digital camera.
One lewd photo was even his screensaver, The San Diego Union-Tribune reported.
“It was the most violating, awful, gut-wrenching feeling ever,” Janks said in court after admitting to the shocking discovery, according to local reports.
“I felt sick, I felt I couldn’t… even touch my own skin.
“I don’t know if there [are] words, not even in a movie have I seen something so sick.”
Interior designer Jade Janks co-founded the research nonprofit Butterfly Farms. (@jadejanksinteriors)
Prosecutors said the defendant texted another man about giving Merriman the pills, the New York Post reported.
“I just dosed the hell out of him. Stopping for whiskey then at Dixieland to stall. LMK,” Janks reportedly texted the day she picked Merriman up from the hospital, Del Portillo asserted.
In another text message shared by prosecutors, Janks seemed uncertain about the alleged plan.
“He’s waking up,” one text reportedly read, according to NBC San Diego. “I really don’t want to be the one to do this.”
“I am about to club him on the head as he is waking up,” another read.
Prosecutors said Janks eventually called another person for assistance, but that person called law enforcement authorities the next day.
Deputies with the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department then searched the location and found Merriman’s body under a pile of boxes, blankets and other trash.
Attorneys for Janks argued that she did not kill Merriman, who instead died from poor health and “his own cocktail” of drugs.
Janks testified that she had been panicking when she left Merriman under a pile of trash in their shared driveway, according to The San Diego Union-Tribune. She had left him sleeping in her SUV on Dec. 31, 2020, because he was intoxicated after drinking whiskey and was too heavy to move, she said. He was dead when she returned on New Year’s Day 2021 to check on him.
“I wasn’t planning to leave him there,” she testified regarding putting his body in the driveway under the boxes, according to The Coast News Group. “I didn’t really know what to do. I wasn’t trying to dump his body.”
Deliberation took less than a day: San Diego interior designer found guilty of murdering Solana Beach stepdad after he stole 100 nude pics https://t.co/3IS7Ot8j2e #Jade Janks #Thomas Merriman pic.twitter.com/DAKcpqpc50
— Scallywagandvagabond (@ScallywagNYC) December 21, 2022
However, jurors apparently did not buy the story, convicting her on Wednesday of first-degree murder, Law&Crime reported.
Janks is scheduled for a sentencing hearing to take place April 3, 2023. She faces 25 years to life in prison.
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