Plea deal taken in slaying of parents

Kim Smith

Thursday, Nov. 7, 2002 | 9:04 a.m.

A 30-year-old Henderson man facing the death penalty in the slayings of his mother and stepfather entered a plea agreement that guarantees he will never be released from prison.

Mathew Frenn pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder with use of a deadly weapon in the June 2001 deaths of Dorothy and Lee Jackson, Chief Deputy District Attorney David Schwartz said.

As a result of the plea agreement, Frenn must serve four no-parole life sentences.

"His charges were such that no matter what term he got, it was not going to be good," Deputy Public Defender Drew Christensen said. "He entered a plea to stay off death row."

Schwartz said Frenn told police he beat his 60-year-old mother with a club and his stepfather with a hammer before stabbing them to death a few days before Father's Day 2001.

The Jacksons' bodies were found in their home near Interstate 215 and Gibson Road weeks later. Dorothy Jackson was found inside her refrigerator, and Lee Jackson, 69, was found in a bathtub that had been covered in plastic.

Frenn was arrested in Texas after police traced him through credit cards they said he took from the Jacksons after their deaths.

Schwartz said the plea agreement was worked out because it was unclear if a jury would give the death penalty to Frenn, who is suffering from HIV and pancreatic cancer.

Had Frenn not been given the death penalty by the jury, he could potentially have received a life sentence with the possibility of parole.