POMEROY, Ohio - Nicole Abboud's voice was shaky at times, but she managed to hold back tears while confronting the man who killed her younger sister and describing the pain the girl's death has caused the Cross Lanes family.
Ernest Roach, 36, of Racine, Ohio, pleaded guilty Thursday to the murder of 16-year-old Ericka Brown, a sophomore at Nitro High School. A judge sentenced him to life in prison, but he will be eligible for parole after 19 years.
Roach strangled Brown, the prosecutor revealed for the first time after the hearing. Police had not said how Brown was killed but said her body was found wrapped in plastic on the banks of the Ohio River at Portland, in Meigs County, Ohio, on Aug. 30, 2014 - 20 days after she was reported missing.
Roach had tied a cinder block to Brown with a ratchet strap before leaving her body in the water.
"She had so many life goals she wanted to accomplish," Abboud said while looking at Roach, who kept his head down during most of the hearing.
In addition to the murder charge, Roach also pleaded guilty to tampering with evidence and gross abuse of a corpse. The murder charge carries a mandatory 15 years to life prison sentence and Roach's attorney asked that Judge I. Carson Crow allow the jail sentences for the additional charges to run at the same time. Crow said, though, that the crime was too severe to provide any leniency.
"Consecutive sentences are appropriate because the harm is so great," the judge said. "A single prison sentence would not be adequate."
A trial had been set to begin next week, but Roach reached a deal with prosecutors earlier this month. The deal dropped additional counts of the evidence tampering and gross abuse charges. Prosecutors also agreed to allow Roach to smoke cigarettes for one hour - on one day only - in exchange for his guilty plea.
Roach met Brown on the Internet after the girl posted an ad on craigslist.org seeking men because she wanted money, according to deputies with the Kanawha County Sheriff's Office. She was killed the same day she was reported missing, Aug. 10.
Roach was interviewed by Kanawha sheriff's deputies on Aug. 27, 2014, after deputies found his cellphone number on Brown's phone. Roach claimed to have no knowledge of the girl and agreed to come back the next day to take a polygraph test. Instead, he fled the area. Roach was arrested two days later by the Ohio State Police in Washington County, Ohio.
Meigs County Prosecuting Attorney Colleen Williams said after Thursday's hearing that Roach hadn't plotted to kill Brown, but became angry with her. That's why Roach wasn't charged with aggravated murder, which carries the possibility of the death penalty in Ohio, the prosecutor said.
Federal authorities in West Virginia dropped charges against Roach for crossing state lines to engage in illicit sexual contact with Brown. U.S. Attorney Booth Goodwin said his office wanted to drop the charge so the murder case could move forward faster. The charge was dismissed without prejudice, meaning it can be refiled.
Roach didn't have anything to say when the judge asked him if he wanted to speak before his sentence was handed down. Before the hearing began, he talked and laughed with a woman sitting behind him. A bailiff identified the woman as Roach's sister.
A victim's advocate read a letter that Brown's father, David, wrote. He wrote that Ericka Brown was the youngest of his three children and that he knew immediately that something was wrong when she didn't come home or call to check on her horses. She had wanted to be a veterinarian.
"How could any man do what this man did to my daughter's body?" his statement asked. "Leaving her on that river bank, knowing that her family was searching for her for 20 days.
"A friend of mine showed me a picture on this man's Facebook a couple days before Ericka's body was found. He posted a picture of himself smiling, like he didn't have a care in the world."
Reach Kate White at kate.white@wvgazette.com, 304-348-1723 or follow @KateLWhite on Twitter.