A young married couple who admitted using Craigslist to lure a victim for thrill-killing pleaded guilty on Tuesday to second-degree murder and other charges in a move that will spare them the death penalty under Pennsylvania law.
Miranda Barbour 19, and Elytte Barbour, 22 who lived in Senlingsgrove, Pennsylvania, face mandatory life sentences without parole for the Nov. 11, 2013 murder of Troy LaFerrara, 42.
Barbour said she used a Craigslist seeking “companionship” to lure the victim to a shopping mall parking lot near their home. She said the couple had tried that unsuccessfully with other men.
Authorities said that after LaFerrara got into her car, her husband, who was hiding in the back seat, reached over and began to choke him while she stabbed the victim.
Barbour and her husband stabbed LaFerrara 20 times and dumped his body in an alley authorities said, adding the killing took place on their three-week wedding anniversary and that they celebrated in a Harrisburg strip club after cleaning their car of blood.
Earlier this year, Barbour told the Daily Item newspaper of Sunbury, Pennslyvania, that she had killed at least 22 people over six years across the country. She stood that statement in an interview with the same newspaper a week ago. Sunbury Police Chief Steve Mazzeo said in March he passed along the information to other jurisdictions.
“I’m not saying I do or don’t believe it,” he said then.
Investigators tracked the couple through phone number in LaFerrara’s phone.
Miranda Barbour grew up in Wasilla, Alaska had made a number of claims to have been a serial killer, authorities said, but none of them could be corroborated.
