Las Vegas Sun

March 18, 2024

LV man who killed teen gets 18-year sentence

The Las Vegas man who pleaded guilty to killing a Henderson teen and later tried to back out of his plea deal was sentenced Wednesday to 18 years in prison.

The sentence will make Stephen Finnegan eligible for parole after six years. His 3 1/2 years credit for prison time already served means he will go before the Parole Board three years from now.

Finnegan, 32, had pleaded guilty to one count each of voluntary manslaughter and second-degree kidnapping in the 1998 killing of 16-year-old Jessica Heaney.

The deal allowed Finnegan to avoid a possible life sentence on initial murder, sexual assault and first-degree kidnapping charges.

Defense attorney Christopher Oram said he planned to appeal the case to the Nevada Supreme Court.

The sentence, pronounced by District Judge Kathy Hardcastle, angered Joanne Calderon, Heaney's sister who attended the sentencing. She said the punishment was hardly enough for her sister's killer and she plans to attend every Parole Board hearing.

"He's a threat to society," she said. "He might be eligible for parole, but I don't think he should get it."

Chief Deputy District Attorney Doug Herndon said he suspected it would be years before Finnegan is paroled.

"I don't anticipate him getting paroled the first time," he said. "I see him doing the better part of the 18 years."

Finnegan's family members maintained Finnegan's innocence outside the courtroom, saying he was forced to sign the guilty plea. Hardcastle had earlier this month refused to allow Finnegan to back out of the deal.

Leslie Finnegan, Finnegan's wife and the mother of his 5-year-old daughter, said her husband couldn't have committed the killing.

"I think he got a raw deal," she said. "I was nine months pregnant at the time. I knew exactly where he was when this crime was committed."

Heaney, a Silverado High School student, was found dead on March 7, 1998, in a clubhouse restroom at the Arbor Court condominiums.

She had been sodomized and strangled. Two years later fingerprints found at the scene were matched to Finnegan, who was living in the condominium complex at the time of Heaney's death.

Finnegan's guilty plea came in December, after a pretrial hearing in which witnesses detailed his alleged sexually deviant behavior and methamphetamine abuse.

The announcement came moments before Hardcastle was expected to rule on whether the prior "bad acts" would be allowed in the trial.

Calderon said Finnegan's history of deviant behavior was the main reason he deserved a stiffer sentence.

"If you look at his past, it fits right into the category of what he did," she said. "But I'm glad this is closure. This has been going on forever."

Calderon, who during the sentencing hearing read a letter from her mother that described the family's heartache, said it felt good to look Finnegan in the eye.

"It was good to look at him and show him what he's done to our family," she said.

Finnegan's sister Kristy Finnegan said her brother's history was the main reason he signed the plea agreement under pressure from defense attorneys.

"He was scared he couldn't win because of his past," she said. "I was in the room when he accepted the deal."

Herndon said Finnegan tried to have it both ways by taking advantage of the deal and maintaining his innocence.

Finnegan could have pleaded guilty pursuant to the Alford plea, in which defendants don't admit guilt but acknowledge prosecutors have enough evidence to convict, he said.

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