Scott Lee Kimball, who is under investigation in the deaths of four people, was sentenced to 48 years in prison Wednesday after pleading guilty to charges unrelated to the disappearances.
Kimball, 42, pleaded guilty to a felony theft charge and three counts of being a habitual criminal during a hearing in Boulder County Court.
The habitual-criminal charges trip led the amount of time he would have faced for felony theft had it been his first felony. Judge James C. Klein handed down the sentence immediately after Kimball entered his plea.
Boulder prosecutors told Klein that the plea deal does not require Kimball to tell them about any known or unknown violent offenses.
A source familiar with Kimball’s case and a family member of one of his purported victims has said that Kimball is talking with prosecutors about a plea deal involving at least one homicide and that he would tell investigators where to find the human remains.
None of those issues was addressed during Wednesday’s hearing, and lawyers on both sides did not answer questions about the case.
While Kimball has been in custody on theft and forgery charges, authorities have been looking for bones and evidence in the disappearances of Kaysi McLeod, Jennifer Marcum, Kimball’s uncle Terry Kimball and Leann Emry. Only remains of McLeod, 19, who was missing for five years, have been found, in rural Jackson County.
Kimball has not been charged in any homicide cases.
Court records show investigators found information about three of the four missing people in Kimball’s laptop computer.
Marcum, a dancer at a Glendale strip club, disappeared Feb. 17, 2003. Her car was found abandoned at a Denver International Airport parking lot.
McLeod was reported missing in August 2003. She was never seen after Kimball was supposed to pick her up from a Thornton hotel. Kimball married Kaysi’s mother, Lori, later that year.
Terry Kimball, 60, disappeared in late 2004, shortly after he arrived in town and began to stay with Scott Kimball. Court records say Scott Kimball told people that his uncle had won the Ohio state lottery, then went to Mexico with a woman.
Emry, 24, disappeared somewhere between Moab and Washington state in 2003. In January 2003, she told her father, Howard, that she was planning a camping trip. Her car was found in Moab.
Marcum’s father, Robert, who lives in Illinois, said he was informed about Kimball’s sentence late Wednesday.
“It’s a good start,” he said.
Felisa Cardona: 303-954-1219 or fcardona@denverpost.com
