Killer, Doing 25 Years, Gets 6 More for Assault on Victim’s Mother
A San Diego man serving a 25-years-to-life sentence for murdering a 6-year-old girl in 1986 received a consecutive six-year prison term Friday for assaulting her mother in a separate incident.
John Phillip Moncrief, 33, was convicted of first-degree murder of Amber Avey in January, 1988, in which witnesses said the girl was kicked and stomped to death in Moncrief’s van.
He went on trial in March for attempted murder of the girl’s mother, Linda Williams, 36, who was his girlfriend at the time, for an incident in August, 1986.
A jury acquitted Moncrief of trying to kill Williams, but found him guilty of assaulting her.
Superior Court Judge David Gill ruled that the six-year term he imposed Friday run consecutively with the murder sentence.
The girl was killed in February, 1986, and secretly buried in Mission Valley in the San Diego River bed. But after Moncrief was arrested for assaulting Williams, she led authorities to her daughter’s body.
Williams testified that Moncrief often threatened to kill her, and that she and her children were afraid of him.
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