Ex-Beauty Queen Sentenced to 4 Years for Murder in 'Drop Dead Gorgeous' Case
Former beauty queen Peggy Sue Thomas has received a four-year prison sentence after agreeing to a plea bargain for a 2003 murder case dubbed "Drop Dead Gorgeous."
Thomas was allegedly an accessory to the murder of Russell Douglas, who was found shot dead in his car two days after Christmas in 2003. Investigators believe Thomas helped lure Russell to a remote area where her then boyfriend, James Huden, shot the man to death.
Huden was sentenced to 80 years in prison. Thomas stated that she took no part in the shooting but agreed to a guilty plea in exchange for a plea bargain that recommended a four-year sentence. The agreement was a disappointment to the family members of Douglas, who believe that he could not have been murdered without Thomas' help.
Get Our Latest News for FREE
"It seems like a travesty of the basic sense of justice that she would be sentenced to less than four years in prison for the cold and premeditated act that could not have happened without her involvement," the victim's father, Jim Douglas, said in court on Friday, ABC News Seattle affiliate KOMO reported.
Thomas was named Ms. Washinton in 2000 and was previously married to an oil millionaire. In court last month Thomas refused to provide any further details into the case or state what the motive was behind the murder.
Thomas was a friend to Douglas' wife, Brenna Douglas, who was also considered a suspect at some point in the case. Some reports allege that Thomas and Huden planned the murder with Douglas' wife in an attempt to collect on a $500,000 life insurance plan that would be shared between the three of them.
"Prosecutors implicated - but never charged - the widow as a shadowy third figure behind the Christmastime murder," said in an April report last year.
Breanna Douglas has since moved and maintains that she had no part in the killing.
