A 32-year-old prison inmate facing the death penalty in the murder of a fellow prisoner pleaded guilty to attempted hindering prosecution in the case Wednesday and agreed to serve three years in prison.
Raymond Hayes admitted, through his attorney, Dan Cooper, that after someone killed Clayton Iron Necklace, 53, with boot laces, he stole some of Iron Necklace's belongings, making it difficult to investigate Iron Necklace's death.
Among the belongings stolen were financial documents that may have provided investigators a motive in the slaying, said Rick Unklesbay, chief trial counsel for the Pima County Attorney's Office.
Iron Necklace was killed June 2, 2007, at the Wilmot Road facility, but his death was initially ruled a suicide.
An investigation was launched into his death when rumors began to swirl, and Hayes and David Scott Hunt, 31, were ultimately arrested and charged with first-degree murder.
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Hunt pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit first-degree murder in June, admitting he conspired with other inmates to kill Iron Necklace and act as a lookout.
It's unlikely anyone will ever know who actually killed Iron Necklace because of the delay in the investigation and because multiple inmates reportedly confessed to multiple other inmates, the attorneys said.
Investigators could not link the boot laces to any particular person's shoes and the DNA on the laces couldn't be matched to anyone either, Unklesbay said.
Moreover, no one could say how long the DNA, which came from semen, had been on the laces or if that person was even involved in the slaying, Unklesbay said.
Hunt received a life sentence with parole possible after 25 years, but the sentence is being served concurrently with two life sentences he's already serving.
Hunt was sentenced to consecutive life terms for the rape and murder of a pizza delivery woman, and the robbery and murder of a cabdriver in the Phoenix area in April 1992 — two months before he turned 15.
Hayes' three-year sentence will begin once he's formally sentenced by Pima County Superior Court Judge Christopher Browning. The former Maricopa County resident recently finished a burglary sentence.
Iron Necklace was in prison on an aggravated assault charge.
