Woman may get light term in conspiracy to kill husband

Her plea of no contest was the latest chapter -- though not the last -- in a stranger-than-fiction case that left a young woman dead and four people behind bars.

Rose, who stood before Superior Court Judge Michael Hayden, has spent the past year and a half in jail.

"To tell you the truth . . . I've been confused since the day I was put in here," she said, often sniffling and brushing her graying hair from her face.

The sentence, which prosecutors will recommend to Hayden Nov. 17, is far less than the standard 12- to 20-year term that goes with the crime.

Deputy Prosecutor Stephen Teply said his office signed off on the lighter penalty because of Rose's mental problems.

"I think we all agreed it was a fair resolution of the case," Teply said.

Attorneys say the plea deal was endorsed by Jerry Rose, the target of the alleged murder-for-hire plot. He filed for divorce within days of his wife's arrest on March 26, 1999.

Police say they stumbled onto the plot earlier that month, when the body of Teresa Rose's 15-year-old daughter, Sarah Starling, was found near Kirkland.

Their investigation revealed that Starling had been helping her mother and Jason McDaniels, a young man the girl had dated, to concoct a plan to kill Starling's stepfather, according to court papers.

Rose told police her 58-year-old husband was verbally abusive to her and Starling, and Starling's friends said the pair would talk about getting rid of him and using insurance money to move back to Hawaii.

Prosecutors say Rose offered to give McDaniels $10,000, two plane tickets to Hawaii and her husband's new sport-utility vehicle to complete the job.

Jerry Rose was not hurt, despite what police say was a botched attempt to strangle him when he came home from work one night in February 1999.

Prosecutors say Teresa Rose told McDaniels and a friend, Justin Hanson, to make her husband's murder look like a robbery -- and not to get any blood on the carpet.

Rose's husband may have unwittingly saved his own life by entering his house through a different door than usual, prosecutors say, forcing the two men to abruptly abort their alleged plan.

But less than a month later, adding to the mystery surrounding the case, Starling's body was found in Kingsgate Park. She had been badly beaten and stabbed.

Prosecutors say she died at the hands of McDaniels, now 21, and a third friend, Thomas Mullin-Coston, now 20. Both men are in the King County Jail awaiting trial: Mullin-Coston on a first-degree murder charge; McDaniels on charges of murder and murder conspiracy.

Hanson, now 19, was freed from jail after 17 months. He is expected to testify against McDaniels, then plead guilty to a lesser charge of rendering criminal assistance.

As Rose was led away from the courtroom in handcuffs yesterday, she cried and told her mother and sister she loved them. Since her arrest, she has often been dazed and profoundly emotional, according to her attorney, Michele Shaw.

"She hasn't really taken the time to grieve the loss of her daughter," she said.

Rose is willing to testify against the two men accused of killing her daughter, Shaw said, and she regrets once allowing McDaniels to live in her home.

"That's something that will haunt her the rest of her life," Shaw said.

For King County sheriff's detectives, the case has been tough from the beginning.

"We had to balance the feelings of sympathy for a mother who lost her daughter to a murder," said Detective Scott Strathy, "with our responsibility for a full and complete investigation of the conspiracy to kill her husband."

Police, who are eager to proceed with the two men's murder trials, do not believe Starling's death is connected to the conspiracy.

P-I reporter Tracy Johnson can be reached at 206-467-5942 or tracyjohnson@seattle-pi.com