Woman sentenced to 5 years for cleaning up blood

By The Standard Staff - 05/13/2006

BILLINGS (AP) — A woman who investigators say was present at two unsolved deaths was sentenced to five years in prison Thursday for tampering with evidence in the September 2004 murder of a Wyoming man.

District Judge Susan Watters rejected a request by Bianca Wilson’s attorneys to suspend the sentence. She also turned down the prosecutor’s request that she be given a 10-year prison sentence because she was present at the September 2004 shooting death of Justin Marchant and the 1997 death of her boyfriend, Tracy Joe Hernandez.

Watters said she couldn’t sentence Wilson based on any ‘‘rumor and innuendo’’ of her involvement in Hernandez’s death or the more recent allegations that she was responsible for Marchant’s murder. Watters noted Wilson had no criminal record.

‘‘My heart will never mend,’’ Connie Marchant, the victim’s mother, said during the sentencing hearing. ‘‘If we had our way, we would have them lock you up and throw away the key.’’

Wilson was initially charged with kidnapping and murdering Marchant, 30, of Crowley, Wyo., whose body was found on a rural Carbon County road just north of the Wyoming border. Prosecutors dropped those charges in April 2005, saying they didn’t have enough evidence to gain a conviction.

Wilson was convicted of tampering with evidence in February, for trying to clean Marchant’s blood from inside a car where he had been shot twice.

Co-defendant Jesus Villareal Jr., pleaded no contest to tampering with evidence in the case, in exchange for his testimony against Wilson. He told jurors he was driving the car with Wilson and Marchant as passengers when Marchant was shot.

Villareal was to be sentenced in March, but Watters rejected as too lenient a plea agreement that called for him to be given a five-year suspended sentence, despite his lengthy criminal record. His case is now set for trial later this year.

Assistant Attorney General Kathy Seeley said the investigation into Justin Marchant’s murder continues.

The Billings Police Department recently reopened the investigation into Hernandez’s death. Wilson said Hernandez shot himself.