Sanpete County man pleads guilty to two murders

MANTI — A man charged with killing two people in Sanpete County will avoid the death penalty, thanks to a plea deal.

But a prosecutor says the best way to resolve the case was to allow him to spend life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Donald Richardson, 48, pleaded guilty Thursday in 6th District Court to two counts of aggravated murder in the deaths of Annette Young, his one-time girlfriend, and Martin Cannon, an acquaintance.

One count of aggravated burglary and two counts of theft were dropped. The burglary charge was for allegedly rifling through Young's home after he killed her and stealing a gun, which he subsequently used to shoot Cannon. He was charged with theft for stealing Young's car.

Sentencing was set for Dec. 10.

At the judge's request, and with families of both victims in the courtroom Thursday, Richardson described how he committed the killings.

He said Young let him into her home just before midnight on April 10. Once inside, he said, he strangled her with his hands.

He drove six miles south to Mt. Pleasant, where he got a couple of drinks and then went to Cannon's trailer home, where he shot him in the face with the .38-caliber handgun.

After the crimes, officers began looking for Richardson in Arizona and Oregon. Although he had been living in the Mt. Pleasant area for about a year, he had ties to both states, particularly Oregon, where he grew up.

The next day, police identified Richardson on surveillance video at a gas station in Burns, Ore. Around midnight on April 11, Richardson turned himself in to Douglas County sheriff's deputies.

Sanpete County Attorney Ross Blackham said he spent the past several months analyzing whether to seek the death penalty in the case.

Richardson had confessed to Oregon authorities. And physical and circumstantial evidence strongly linked him to the crime, Blackham said. So he believed the defense would have had a difficult time disproving the slayings.

But proving the case qualified for the death penalty would have been more problematic, Blackham said. The most viable grounds, he said, was that Richardson planned to commit both murders — that they were part of a "common scheme."

Blackham said Richardson's attorney had warned that he was prepared to challenge whether Blackham "could connect the dots on that."