EVERETT — Debra Canady and Brent Starr won’t be together as they planned when they plotted to get rid of David Grim.
Canady and Starr are off to separate prisons. They each were sentenced Tuesday to 28 years behind bars for Grim’s violent bludgeoning murder in 2008.
Their relationship also has apparently fallen apart. Starr was married in a jailhouse ceremony to someone else last week, his attorney, Anna Goykhman confirmed Tuesday. The woman was in the courtroom as Starr told the judge he was wrongly convicted.
“There are many bad, terrible things that happen in this life like people who commit crimes and don’t get caught and people who don’t commit crimes and get convicted,” said Starr, 31.
Canady, 46, also maintained that she didn’t participate in the brutal killing. “I know we’re innocent,” she said. “All I can try to do is appeal it.”
A Snohomish County jury last month convicted Canady and Starr of first-degree murder while armed with a deadly weapon. Jurors were told Canady was upset that Grim wouldn’t move out of her Sultan house. She wanted her new beau and his young daughter to move in with her. The jury believed the couple plotted to kill Grim days before his death.
Snohomish County deputy prosecutor Ed Stemler told jurors Canady first attempted to buy oleander seeds to poison Grim. Starr bought a gun and stalked Grim but discarded the plan. He realized he couldn’t get into the house without being spotted by neighbors who were outside late into the night.
Finally, on June 26, Starr crept into the house and attacked a sleeping Grim with a hammer.
Investigators found damning text messages between the couple.
On the morning of the murder, Starr sent Canady a message stating “its done.” Canady replied back, asking “was it quiet” and then warned Starr that he may have to get rid of his clothes “if they come to question you.”
She directed Starr to erase the messages, Stemler told jurors.
The convictions carried a mandatory minimum 22-year sentence. Stemler asked for more time.
“This was a particularly violent death for Mr. Grim,” who likely didn’t die right away, Stemler said.
Karie Mitchell told Snohomish County Superior Court Judge Ronald Castleberry her ex-husband’s murder has devastated the couple’s sons Jeremy, 22, and Chris, 19.
Canady and Starr “took something from my children they will never get back,” Mitchell said. She called their actions unforgiveable. She said she only wished there was a life sentence for stupidity.
The convicted killers’ mothers both spoke to the judge, telling him they are convinced their children are innocent.
Castleberry disagreed with the mothers. He said after sitting through the trial and hearing the evidence he is confident the jury made the right decision.
“This was a brutal, horrific premeditated murder,” Castleberry said. “This was a killing, a murder the defendants jointly were talking about and planning for several weeks. It was just cold-blooded.”
Attacking a man with a hammer while he slept, striking him 20 to 30 times in the head was brutal and savage, Castleberry said.
“No matter what Mr. Grim may or may not have done or what kind of life he lived, he did not deserve to die this way,” the judge said.
Diana Hefley: 425-339-3463, hefley@heraldnet.com.
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