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HEBER CITY — Wasatch County prosecutors have announced they will not seek the death penalty for a convicted killer who now stands accused of beating a teenager to death in 1995.
Joseph Michael Simpson was arrested in September and charged with aggravated murder for the bludgeoning death of 17-year-old Krystal Lynn Beslanowitch. The girl's bloody and broken body was found on Dec. 15, 1995, along the banks of the Provo River near Midway. Investigators believe she was beaten to death with rocks.
On Monday, prosecutors notified 4th District Judge Steven Hansen that they will not seek to have Simpson executed if he is convicted. Instead he will face the sentencing options of life with the possibility of parole or life without parole, should a jury find him guilty.
"In every aggravated murder case there are a lot of factors we look at," Wasatch County Attorney Scott Sweat said Tuesday. "We looked at those factors in this case and determined we would not seek the death penalty."
Sweat declined to go into detail about what led to the decision, citing a desire to preserve the integrity of the case and protect Simpson's right to a fair trial.
Simpson was arrested in August 1987 by Clearfield police and convicted of murder in a Farmington court a couple of months later, according to court records. He first arrived at the Utah State Prison in November 1987.
Simpson was first paroled in April 1995. Beslanowitch was killed eight months later. It would be almost 18 years though before advances in DNA analysis linked Simpson to the teen's death, authorities said.
In addition to the aggravated murder charge, Simpson faces a separate count of assault by a prisoner. The third-degree felony charge was filed in January after Simpson and another Wasatch County jail inmate got in a fight over a TV remote in their cellblock, according to charging documents.
Simpson, 47, remains in the Wasatch County Jail where he is being held without bail.
