Plot to Compel False Confession Alleged in Slaying

A woman accused of killing a Lemon Heights man and his mother before setting fire to their mansion now faces charges that she plotted from jail to force a confession from another woman.

Tynickia Sherikia Thompson, 19, has pleaded not guilty to the murder and conspiracy charges stemming from the May 8 shooting deaths of John Tyler Hancock and his mother, Helen Bauerle Hancock.

Prosecutors say the conspiracy began June 1 when Thompson allegedly asked another inmate to arrange for a friend to force a confession from the slain businessman’s ex-girlfriend, according to the conspiracy charges filed Monday in Municipal Court in Santa Ana.

“Thompson requested that this ‘friend’ use force and intimidation to cause [the ex-girlfriend] to make a tape-recorded statement taking responsibility for the murder that Thompson was charged with,” Deputy Dist. Atty. Carolyn Kirkwood said in court papers.

Thompson allegedly gave the inmate the woman’s address, with an attached map, and wrote a detailed “script” of the confession the woman would be forced to recite. The woman would also be forced to say she framed Thompson, prosecutors charged.

Under the alleged plot, which was never carried out, copies of the forced confession would have been sent to Thompson’s lawyer and mother.

During the same time, prosecutors allege that Thompson tried to arrange a robbery and assault of her ex-boyfriend, a key prosecution witness in the murder case.

Thompson allegedly plotted with the same inmate to have a male inmate get a “crew” together to carry out the attack. She included a description of her boyfriend and directions to his home, as well as information about the types of valuables that could be stolen from him as “additional inducement to the persons who agreed to commit the attack,” the prosecutor charged.

Thompson is the only one facing conspiracy charges at this time from the alleged plots.

Thompson was arrested shortly after the bodies of 49-year-old John Hancock and his 77-year-old mother were found in their 4,200-square-foot rented mansion, which had been torched.

A preliminary hearing is set in December to determine if there is enough evidence for Thompson to stand trial in Orange County Superior Court. Prosecutors have not yet decided whether they will seek the death penalty.