The Amish & Crime

Justo Smoker today pleaded guilty to third-degree murder, kidnapping and other charges, admitting to killing Linda Stoltzfoos in June of last year. He will serve a sentence of 35½-to-71 years in prison as part of a plea deal. Smoker is 35 years old. He will avoid the death penalty. He also faces further charges over a parole violation which could add about 17½ more years. Lancaster…

It’s being reported that Justo Smoker is expected to plead guilty tomorrow (Friday) in the Lancaster County Courthouse. Smoker has been charged with homicide, kidnapping and false imprisonment regarding the disappearance and death of Linda Stoltzfoos. However, one – wrinkle? – in this report is the fact that it’s not being made known to which charges he’ll plead guilty. From Lancaster Online: The Lancaster County…

An upstate New York man used explosive Molotov cocktails to “burn down the mailboxes” of two Amish “business associates”. It’s been well-documented that Amish can be targets of vandalism and harrassment. Some cases are driven by pure dislike of the Amish, or as a sort of boredom-killing prank. This case seems to have had a financial motive behind it. According to the story in WNYT…

It has not been confirmed by authorities that these are Linda’s remains. The remains were found near the former workplace of Justo Smoker, who has been charged with homicide in the case. From Fox43: Police say they have located human remains while searching for missing 18-year-old Lancaster County Amish woman, Linda Stoltzfoos. The FBI and State Police say they recovered the remains in a rural…

Justo Smoker’s preliminary hearing was held Friday, to determine if the homicide case against him would go to trial. After an hour-and-twenty minute hearing, District Judge Denise Commins ruled that prosecutors had met the burden to proceed. They needed to provide sufficient evidence that a crime was committed in the case of Linda Stoltzfoos’ disappearance last summer, and that the defendant is likely responsible. These…

The news is breaking that Justo Smoker, charged with kidnapping Linda Stoltzfoos, has now been charged with killing her: State police on Monday charged Justo Smoker — already facing a trial related to the kidnapping of Amish teen Linda Stoltzfoos — directly with the June death of the Lancaster woman, according to an arrest warrant. Police cited numerous sources of evidence, including witness accounts, DNA…

Linda Stoltzfoos‘ 19th birthday was last week. It’s now been 5 months since she disappeared. Lancaster Online shares a brief update. Unfortunately there are few positive details in it, other than the fact the investigation is ongoing. However, I think that is good to keep in mind: Saturday marks five months since Linda Stoltzfoos disappeared — kidnapped, according to authorities, while walking home from church…

Some new info in the Linda Stoltzfoos disappearance case. Unsealed court documents have shown that kidnapping suspect Justo Smoker sent multiple messages to his brother Victor in a window of time beginning about 20 minutes after Linda was last seen. The detective who applied for the search warrant stated that the text messages “would be directly after Linda Stoltzfoos was kidnapped.” Via Lancaster Online: In…