El Cajon

An El Cajon sailor was sentenced Friday to 20 years to life in state prison for brutally murdering his wife’s roommate and for soliciting the murder of his wife.

Jeffrey Allen Walsh, 21, gave no response when San Diego Superior Court Judge J. Perry Langford pronounced the sentence.

Langford said that Walsh had exploded in anger many times and had tried to get someone to kill his wife and her roommate.

“He finally explodes and does it himself. When he explodes, he really explodes,” Langford said.

Walsh became angry when his wife, Cheryl, 21, moved in with Tammy Swetof, 23, of El Cajon, and filed for divorce after five months of marriage.

Walsh repeatedly solicited shipmates to murder his estranged wife, or Swetof or both women, Deputy Dist. Atty. John Massucco said.

“This man deserves the death penalty” for beating Swetof on the head with a rolling pin, striking her 26 times and then stabbing her several times, Massucco said.

“It was a brutal crime to my wife,” said John Swetof III, 26, of El Cajon, who was estranged from Tammy Swetof at the time of her death. “He not only murdered her, he tortured her until she died.”

Langford sentenced Walsh to 16 years to life for the Nov. 25 murder of Swetof and four years for soliciting the murder of his wife.

The jury convicted Walsh on July 8 of second-degree murder, five counts of soliciting his wife’s slaying, two counts of soliciting Swetof’s death, and two counts of soliciting others to commit perjury for him. He was acquitted of one count of soliciting perjury.