ANCHORAGE, Alaska (TCD) — A judge sentenced a 42-year-old man to over 70 years in prison for shooting, beating, and suffocating a 31-year-old woman, then leaving her body in a car that he crashed while intoxicated.
The Alaska Department of Law announced Wednesday, April 3, that Benjamin Wilkins was ordered to spend the maximum sentence of 75 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to the second-degree murder of Jacqueline Goodwin. According to the Anchorage Daily News, as part of the plea deal, prosecutors dropped charges of first-degree murder, kidnapping, and other drug-related offenses.
On the evening of June 27, 2016, Anchorage Police Department officers were called to a car collision near Alaska Regional Hospital and determined that a car drove off the road and into a pole. The pole fell across the road and the driver, Wilkins, was arrested under suspicion of impaired driving. Goodwin’s body was still in the car when police arrived.
The Department of Law wrote in the news release that Wilkins shot Goodwin in the stomach, “severely beat her, and suffocated her by taping her nose and mouth and placing a plastic bag over her head, sealed shut with duct tape and zip tie.” Judge Andrew Peterson said Wilkins tortured her and exhibited “extreme, deliberate cruelty.”
Goodwin’s body was reportedly found inside a sleeping bag and an autopsy showed she had been beaten over 100 times, according to the Anchorage Daily News.
Peterson argued he believed Wilkins’ family was involved because his mother “heard the beating and murder of Goodwin, yet never helped.” Wilkins’ brother allegedly helped him clean up the scene and get rid of evidence. When investigators searched Wilkins’ home, they reportedly found over 30 pounds of drugs and $125,000 in cash. He previously served time in federal prison for drug crimes.
The Anchorage Daily News reports Wilkins’ mother and stepbrother both pleaded guilty to hindering prosecution and tampering with evidence.
Peterson reportedly told Wilkins the “level of cruelty is unimaginable.”
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