Moments after strangling Jenni-Lyn Watson with his bare hands, Steven M. Pieper carried her body out to his car in the driveway of the victim's home and dumped the remains in the trunk of his vehicle.



It was broad daylight, just about 11:30 a.m. Nov. 19, but no one saw him, according to District Attorney William Fitzpatrick.



Moments later, though, Pieper was stopped by an Onondaga County Sheriff's deputy for not having a front license plate on his vehicle.



Thinking he'd been caught with the body of his dead former girlfriend in the trunk of the vehicle, Pieper's heart had to be racing at about 200 beats a minute at that moment, Fitzpatrick said today.



But the deputy let the "overly solicitous" Pieper go with a warning and Pieper drove off with Watson's body undiscovered in the trunk.



Fearing he'd get stopped again for still not having a front license plate, Pieper made the decision to go to the nearby Clay Park Central where he dumped Watson's body in a swampy, wooded area and covered it with vegetation to try to conceal the remains.



Eight days later, the body was found and Pieper was charged with murder.



In Onondaga County Court this morning, Pieper was arraigned on a second-degree murder indictment and immediately pleaded guilty as charged.



The court appearance took all of eight minutes.

Pieper, 21, of 8237 Coconut Tree Drive, Clay, will be back March 8 to be sentenced by County Judge Anthony Aloi to 23 years to life in state prison.

Members of Watson's family sat stoically on the prosecutor's side of the courtroom as the guilty plea was entered. They then were escorted by Fitzpatrick up to the bench for a private conversation with the judge.



Members of Pieper's family, some wiping away tears, sat on the opposite side of the courtroom for the plea.



Both families left court without comment after the guilty plea.



Defense lawyer Scott Brenneck said Pieper chose to plead guilty at his arraignment to spare both families the trauma of a trial.



Fitzpatrick said Pieper apparently realized conviction was inevitable given "the mountain of evidence" against him. He said the prosecution has spent much of the past several months sharing that evidence with Brenneck to share with Pieper so the defendant realized "there was no escape.'



When they hear of a case like this, people expect to see a "Jack the Ripper" as the killer, Fitzpatrick said. But that's not what the Watson case presented, he said, noting Pieper was "a diminutive, 150-pound guy who is just a killer."



For the first time, Fitzpatrick then revealed Pieper strangled Watson with his bare hands. The prosecutor said he suspects that happened after Watson informed Pieper she was not interested in continuing a relationship with him.



"On that particular day, he was consumed with evil and he killed that poor little girl for no reason other than that she wanted to move on," Fitzpatrick said. "There are monsters among us," he added.



Fitzpatrick said he did not believe Pieper had any intent to kill Watson when he went to her home about 9 a.m. Nov. 19. That was the day after the 20-year-old Watson came home from Mercyhurst College in Pennsylvania to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with her family.



According to the prosecutor, it was between 11 a.m. and 11:15 a.m. when Watson reportedly told Pieper the relationship was over. He couldn't accept that, Fitzpatrick said.



"In a spontaneous act of rage, he choked the life out of her," Fitzpatrick said.

Fitzpatrick previously said he suspected Pieper backed his car into the Watson garage to place the body in the trunk without being seen. But he admitted today that Pieper carried the body in broad daylight out to where his car was parked in the driveway and placed it in the trunk without being seen by anyone.



But moments later, Deputy Sean Andrews stopped Pieper's car for not having a front license plate and Pieper had to think he'd been caught, Fitzpatrick said. Pieper was overly solicitous and apologetic and Andrews let him go with a warning, the district attorney said.



That's apparently what prompted Pieper to drive to the nearby park to get rid of Watson's body before he got stopped again, Fitzpatrick said.



Pieper's own efforts to distract attention from him helped build a case against him, the district attorney said.



When Pieper left the house with Watson's body, he also took Watson's cell phone to try to make it look like she was alive after he left her, Fitzpatrick said. His intent was to try to show she may have left home with the stranger Pieper claimed he saw outside the house when he left, the prosecutor said.



But that stranger story was a lie and authorities were able to trace the "pings" from Watson's phones to area cell towers in order to place her in the vicinity of the park where the body was found, Fitzpatrick said.



The phone also mysteriously turned back on two days after her disappearance, leading authorities to trace the phone to the county's garbage burning steam plant on Rock Cut Road, he said. The phone itself was never recovered, he said.



According to Fitzpatrick, the cell tower signals from the use of Watson's phone the day she was killed traced Pieper's circular route leaving the house and going to the park to dispose of the body.



Authorities also focused on Pieper as a suspect because he left his own cell phone behind at Watson's home, Fitzpatrick said. It was discovered when family returned home to find the victim missing that afternoon, he said.



According to Fitzpatrick, Pieper had been bragging in jail that authorities didn't have any evidence that would convict him so he wanted to take his case to trial. That changed as the prosecution shared its evidence with Brenneck to share with Pieper, the DA said.



"It would've been a very strong case," he said. Fitzpatrick commended the work of Sheriff's Department detectives for building the case as "a noose around his neck."



Sheriff Kevin Walsh and members of his detective squad were in court for Pieper's guilty plea.



According to Fitzpatrick, Pieper has never expressed any remorse for what he did in conversations with the prosecution in jail since his arrest. Pieper confessed to the crime when he testified recently before the grand jury that indicted him Monday on the second-degree intentional murder charge, the prosecutor said.



While the prosecution had suggested it could seek a more serious first-degree murder charge – carrying a maximum penalty of life in prison without the possibility of parole – Fitzpatrick today declined comment on what additional felony crime he would have argued Pieper committed to support such a charge.



"He pleaded guilty to the crime I could prove at trial," the prosecutor said.

Jim O'Hara can be reached at johara@syracuse.com or 470-2260.

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