Suspect pleads guilty in girl's murder

Steve Jefferson/Eyewitness News

Crothersville, March 24 - Jackson County deputies moved Anthony Ray Stockelman under heavy security. He appeared in court for his plea bargain hearing Friday morning.

The 39-year-old admits he killed Kaitlyn Collman.

"Always smiling, always wanted to help," that's how John Neace says Kaitlyn's family wants her remembered.

Prosecutors say that in January 2005 Stockelman kidnapped Kaitlyn from her Crothersville home. For five days the community searched.

Then on January 30 authorities recovered her body in a creek.

Neace says, "There will never be closure for us. This will be a wound that will never end."

Investigators used DNA to link Stockelman to her death.

Stephen Pierson is the Jackson County Prosecutor. "I think that's what turned the case."

Forensic experts found Stockelman's DNA on the strings used to tie up Kaitlyn, his DNA on the victim's body and on a cigarette butt at the crime scene.

Even with all the DNA samples, the prosecutor still agreed to the plea bargain in this case, and so did the victim's family.

"We said all along that if he confesses to it, we would take down the death penalty from off the table," says Neace.

Pierson adds, "The guilty man goes to jail, the state argues life without the chance of parole. We think we will be successful in that."

Although Stockelman stayed quiet as deputies escorted him under tight security, he did send a message through attorney James Kilburn. "He asked me to convey that he is sorry, sorry for the pain and suffering he's caused for anyone."

Becky Drucker is Stockelman's sister-in-law. "He is sorry. He admitted to it. He stood up to it. He has to face God."

But after waiting more than a year for justice and after losing a ten-year-old described as always smiling, "Sorry will never change what he did," says Neace.

Kaitlyn's family says the confessed killer's apology is much too little and even more so too late.

Anthony Ray Stockleman goes back to court next Month for sentencing. The judge will hear from his family as well as the victim's family at that time before handing down his punishment.