The Pinal County Attorney’s Office intends to seek the death penalty against Ricky Wassenaar, who had publicly claimed that he killed three men in a Tucson prison.
Wassenaar, 63, faces first-degree murder charges in the April 2025 killings of Saul Alvarez, Thorne Harnage and Donald Lashley, who were in prison with Wassenaar.
Wassenaar
Wassenaar made claims about killing the men after he had complained to prison officials about placing another inmate in his cell in a sex-offender unit, according to the Arizona Mirror.
More than two decades before the murders, Wassenaar was involved in a 2004 prison escape attempt. He was already serving time for a 1997 robbery when he and another man took two prison guards hostage for more than two weeks. He later received multiple life sentences.
People are also reading…
Although the case is in Pima County, the Pinal County Attorney’s Office is prosecuting it because the Pima County Attorney’s Office has a conflict of interest, having prosecuted the men who were later killed in prison.
“I believe the death penalty is the appropriate sentence given the defendant’s extensive history of violence," Pinal County Attorney Brad Miller said in a released statement.
