VENTURA COUNTY NEWS : Conspirator in Merriman Case Is Sentenced : Courts: Jennifer Wepplo of Camarillo is second woman to receive one-year jail term for helping murder suspect to intimidate witnesses.

A 23-year-old Camarillo woman was sentenced Thursday to a year in County Jail for conspiring with Ventura white supremacist Justin Merriman to intimidate witnesses in his murder case.

Jennifer Wepplo, who pleaded guilty last month to a single count of conspiracy, admitted writing at least 10 letters to members of a skinhead gang earlier this year asking them to “take out” grand jury witnesses whose testimony helped secure an indictment against Merriman, 26.

Dressed in jail blues, Wepplo sat expressionless as Deputy Dist. Atty. Ron Bamieh read portions of one of those letters.

It was sent to a skinhead gang member incarcerated at Ironwood State Prison near Blythe and sought assistance in silencing another inmate who testified against Merriman, the prosecutor said.

“Tell all the brothers in the yard . . . to take that deal-making, wire-wearing punk out,” the letter read. “He’s just an oxygen-wasting fool.”

Bamieh told Superior Court Judge Bruce Clark that Wepplo also wrote crass remarks about women who told the grand jury Merriman raped them several years ago.

Wepplo deserves to spend time behind bars, Bamieh said. “She was aggressive and she was hostile.”

But the prosecutor balanced his position by saying Wepplo is young, entered an early plea and has no adult criminal record. For those reasons, he said, she should be given jail time but not go to prison.

Defense attorney Nancy Aronson asked for a shorter jail term. She told the judge that her client got mixed up with a bad crowd, but has since made better choices. Aronson said Wepplo has stopped using drugs and is trying to “get away from those people.”

“She didn’t realize the seriousness of what she was doing,” Aronson said. “I think she has learned her lesson.”

Merriman was indicted nine months ago on charges including rape and murder in the 1992 killing of Santa Monica College student Katrina Montgomery.

Prosecutors say he conspired with several women, including Wepplo and his mother, to intimidate grand jury witnesses.

Samantha Medina, 25, of Madera was sentenced last month to a year in Ventura County Jail after pleading guilty to an identical conspiracy charge.

Beverlee Sue Merriman, the defendant’s 51-year-old mother, also faces conspiracy and perjury charges. Her trial is set for January.

Montgomery, a 20-year-old former Ventura High School student, disappeared Nov. 28, 1992, after leaving a party in Oxnard thrown by a skinhead friend. She was never seen again, although her blood-stained truck was found the next day in the Angeles National Forest.

The case stumped investigators for years, but in 1997 authorities found a witness who said he watched Merriman rape, stab and bludgeon Montgomery to death. The witness, a former San Fernando Valley skinhead gang member, told authorities he was too scared to intervene.

In December, several skinhead gang members who knew Merriman--and women who said he raped them in the past--testified before the grand jury. A 25-count indictment was returned the following month, and Merriman pleaded not guilty to the alleged crimes.

He was indicted again by the grand jury in May after authorities found out about the witness intimidation. His trial is set for March.