Randall Edward Connor was sentenced Wednesday to 32 years in prison for the first-degree murder of Merianne Lorentson in 2007 at her Kent apartment.
King County Superior Court Judge Sharon Armstrong gave Connor, 31, the maximum sentence at the King County Courthouse in Seattle. A jury found Connor guilty on April 14 after one day of deliberations.
Lorentson, 24, an aspiring model and a single mother of a then 5-year-old daughter, was found March 9, 2007 stabbed to death in her living room at an apartment in the 10400 block of Kent-Kangley Road. She was stabbed more than 30 times in her head, neck and body, according to the King County Medical Examiner’s autopsy report.
There was no sign of forced entry into the apartment, which led police to believe Lorentson knew the attacker. Lorentson’s daughter was not at home during the attack.
Connor, who once lived in SeaTac, had dated Lorentson, according to the charging papers.
Lorentson had told friends that she feared Connor because he had assaulted and threatened her at gunpoint, according to the charging papers. Connor also had reportedly told Lorentson he would kill any man he saw with her. Relatives of Connor told police that Lorentson had broken up with him.
Connor pleaded not guilty to the first-degree murder charge in April 2008.
The U.S. Marshal’s Service, with assistance from the Kent Police, arrested Connor March 12, 2007 in Seattle on a California parole violation.
Over the next year, Kent detectives used DNA test results, cell phone records and interviews with friends and relatives of Conner and Lorentson to build their case against Connor.
Prosecutors said Connor served six years for armed robbery at Pelican Bay State Prison in California. Since his initial release in December 2004, Connor has been returned to California three times on parole violations.
While in prison in California, Connor participated in a riot, battered another inmate and received a high-risk prisoner label by the state of California, according to the charging papers.
At the time of the murder of Lorentson, Connor had been out of prison for a little more than two months and lived in SeaTac. Connor told police he started a relationship with Lorentson in 2005.
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