Inset: Jack Waldrop (Kennewick Police Department). Background: The area near the Kennewick Police Department in Washington, which handled his kidnapping and assault case (Google Maps).
A Washington state man said this week that he plans to take a plea deal after being accused of kidnapping and threatening to kill his ex-girlfriend. Prosecutors say the man offered to give his ex a ride to run an errand and then told her “she was going to die today” while she was in his pickup truck.
Jack Waldrop III, a 57-year-old convicted felon who spent two decades behind bars for killing another former girlfriend, is charged with first-degree kidnapping, second-degree assault and violating a court order in connection with a 2022 attack on a 63-year-old ex.
Court officials confirmed to Law&Crime that Waldrop is scheduled to appear in court Wednesday to make a plea change after he pleaded not guilty in May 2022. He is expected to change his pleas for the kidnapping and order violation charge in exchange for the assault charge being dropped.
The Tri-City Herald reports that Waldrop will face up to eight years in prison as part of the plea deal. Court documents obtained by the local newspaper outline how he was ordered to stay away from his ex after she got a protection order against him, which he allegedly ignored.
In March 2022, prosecutors say, Waldrop offered to give the woman a ride to run an errand and they got into a fight while on the way there after the victim overheard a conversation that Waldrop was having over the phone that upset her.
The woman got out of Waldrop”s Ford F-150 and began walking toward a bus stop when Waldrop pulled up moments later and offered to take her home, according to the court documents. A police press release said that once she got back inside the vehicle, Waldrop “drove her against her will out of the Tri-Cities” area and began threatening her.
The pair allegedly fought inside the vehicle, with the victim falling out of the F-150 at one point, according to prosecutors. Waldrop was stomping her, yanking her hair, and punching her in the back while telling her she was “going to die,” per the court docs. He also allegedly threatened to take his own life.
Waldrop allegedly started driving toward Snoqualmie Pass while he was backhanding her throughout the trip. They stopped at a gas station and he told the victim to go inside to get cleaned up; she “sought help from a citizen” while hiding in the bathroom and Waldrop was told to stay away from her by patrons inside, according to police.
Authorities were notified and Waldrop allegedly fled from the gas station in his truck. He was apprehended in California several weeks later. His ex was hospitalized with two broken ribs and a fractured sternum.
Waldrop had a trial date set for June 13 before accepting his plea deal this week.
A felon with ties to Oregon, Waldrop was convicted in 1998 of first-degree manslaughter after he pleaded guilty to beating and strangling Angela Walker at her apartment in Salem. He was sentenced to a little over 21 years in prison.
“They know what to do with vicious animals like you,” the victim’s father told Waldrop at his sentencing, according to the Statesman Journal.
The deputy district attorney who prosecuted Waldrop for that attack reportedly told the newspaper, “This is the most classic case of battered woman syndrome I’ve ever seen. He’s dangerous and I wish we could have given him more time. If you have a spouse or a boyfriend who’s abusive, get the hell out before it’s too late.”
Waldrop’s brother Michael Waldrop was sentenced in 1995 to 20 years behind bars for running over and killing his mother-in-law, Elizabeth Claypool, as she was trying to get her two grandchildren, ages 3 and 4, out of his pickup truck, according to the Associated Press.
It’s unclear whether Waldrop’s ex who survived his attack was aware that he had killed a woman in Oregon and went to prison for it. Waldrop was released in 2018.
