Former East Layton police officer pleads no contest to child sex abuse charges

LAYTON — Former East Layton police officer Thomas Richard Jackson, 78, was first charged with a child sex abuse crime in 1986, a decade after his law enforcement career ended.

Court records, along with the personal recollections of Jackson's children, reveal that in May of that year Jackson committed an act of molestation against his daughters. The girls, ages 11 and 9, had two friends over at their home for a sleepover when the abuse occurred. Those friends informed their parents, who told their Latter-day Saint bishop what Jackson had done.

The bishop referred Jackson to a therapist, who instructed Jackson to confess his crime to Layton police. Jackson did, but Layton police declined to book him into jail. Jackson remained free even after the Davis County Attorney's Office filed a single count of 2nd-degree felony count of sexual abuse of a child against him.

Jackson pleaded guilty to the charge and went before Utah 2nd District Court Judge Douglas Cornaby for sentencing on Nov. 10, 1986. The victims, Jackson's daughters, accompanied him to court, where a bailiff instructed the girls to wait outside in the hallway while their father faced the judge.

"We were just outside the courtroom, ready to tell our story," Jackson's eldest daughter, Heidi Holmberg, said in an interview for KSL's investigative podcast series COLD.

Holmberg was 11 years old at the time, accompanied by her 9-year-old sister, Tori Riddle. KSL does not typically identify victims of child sex abuse, but Holmberg and Riddle have chosen to forego anonymity. Riddle said she was prepared to tell the judge that her father had done far more than just a single act of abuse, having molested her many times over the course of her childhood.

"He told us, 'This is what daddies do, but don't tell anyone or they'll take me away,'" Riddle said.

Cornaby never called the girls into the courtroom. The judge did not ask the young victims a single question about the extent of the abuse they'd experienced.

"I just remember being there and being ready to tell the truth," Riddle said, "and then, nothing."

A slap on the wrist for Tom Jackson

Under Utah law, Thomas "Tom" Jackson's conviction on a 2nd degree felony should've carried a sentence of 1-to-15 years in prison. Cornaby instead handed down a more lenient term of 0-to-5 years, then suspended the prison term altogether and placed Jackson on probation. That meant Jackson did not spend a single day incarcerated for the crime.

The judge instructed Jackson to undergo counseling, to pay a fine and to perform 200 hours of community service. Jackson then returned home with his victims, where his daughters allege he continued to molest them.

"At that age you don't understand the law," Holmberg said. "You don't understand that he should be going to prison."

Archived court records do not reveal Cornaby's reasoning for showing Jackson such leniency. The case also did not make the news at the time, raising questions about whether Jackson might've received special treatment due to his status as a former police officer.

Jackson's wife filed for divorce several years later, in 1991. At that time, Jackson moved to Buhl, Idaho where he met and married a woman who had 4 daughters, all under the age of 10.

Idaho charges Tom Jackson with child sex crimes

In December of 1995, two of Jackson's stepdaughters disclosed to their mother that Jackson had spent years molesting them. As a result, Jackson was again arrested and charged with child sex crimes. Unlike what'd happened in Utah a decade earlier, Jackson was booked into an Idaho jail where he remained through the resolution of the case.

"When we found out that he had been caught doing this again, I was so mad," Jackson's daughter Tori Riddle said.

Jackson accepted a plea deal in early 1996, admitting to a single count of lewd and lascivious conduct with a child in exchange for a second count being dropped. His biological daughters, Holmberg and Riddle, testified against their father at his sentencing hearing on April 2, 1996.

"I told him at that time, 'I'm here to make sure you never do this to another little girl again,'" Riddle said.

Idaho 5th Judicial District Judge R. Barry Wood sentenced Jackson to life in prison, calling attention to Jackson's past training and experience as a police officer.

"You know what's right from wrong, you're a graduate from the police academy, ... ," Wood said, according to a transcript of the sentencing hearing obtained by COLD. "I think you're dangerous as hell."

Jackson's life sentence did not stand, however. He appealed his sentence, and in a split decision, the Idaho Supreme Court determined Wood abused his discretion in delivering an overly harsh sentence. Idaho's high court reduced Jackson's sentence from life in prison to 15 years to life. Jackson completed his 15 years of incarceration and was released on parole in 2011.

The COLD podcast interviews Tom Jackson

KSL's COLD podcast approached Jackson in April of 2023 to interview him about his work on the July 4, 1975 cold case disappearance of Nancy Perry Baird. Jackson was working as a reserve officer for the East Layton Police Department at the time Baird was last seen. His first wife had also been a childhood friend of Baird's.

The disappearance of Nancy Baird had long been attributed to serial killer Theodore "Ted" Bundy. However, COLD uncovered evidence showing Bundy was 100 miles from East Layton on the day Baird vanished. That alibi, as well as a portion of Jackson's comments, was included in a May 2023 bonus episode of COLD titled "The Convenient Alternative."

Upon hearing the podcast, Jackson's daughters, Holmberg and Riddle, began to wonder whether their father might have been responsible for Baird's disappearance, rather than Bundy. Jackson's account of his actions and whereabouts on the night Baird was last seen included significant inconsistencies.

"We know he's a child molester, but this is a whole other level," Holmberg said.

Holmberg approached a Davis County Sheriff's detective to discuss her concerns, hoping to provide cold case investigators with context about her father's criminal past.

"[The detective] asked me about the abuse, the molesting," Holmberg said.

Holmberg explained the history of her father's first arrest. She told the detective Jackson had continued abusing her after Cornaby allowed Jackson to return home with his 11 and 9-year-old victims back in 1986. The detective, realizing Holmberg was describing crimes for which Jackson had not previously been arrested or charged, suggested they try to draw a confession out of Jackson.

A phone call for closure

At that point in 2023, Holmberg had not spoken with her father in 20 years. At the urging of police, she called Jackson and put the phone on speaker so a detective could listen in on the conversation.

"We got him on the phone," Holmberg said. "I said, 'I'm in counseling. I need to get some closure.'"

An audio recording of the call reviewed by COLD revealed Jackson spoke openly about the years of abuse he'd committed against his daughters. Holmberg pressed Jackson to discuss incriminating details, including the age at which the abuse first started.

"There was times that I'd bring you into the bedroom and you were only like, maybe 3, 4 at the most," Jackson said during the phone call. "It was just all about me. 'I want this, and it doesn't matter who I hurt. I need this,' you know?"

Holmberg also succeeded in getting Jackson to admit during the call that he'd continued abusing his daughters following his first arrest in 1986. Jackson's statements led Davis County prosecutors to file new criminal charges against him in August of 2023. The five felony counts of sexual abuse of a child covered alleged acts committed against Holmberg and Riddle, as well as another relative, between 1983 and 1988.

In the charging document, a prosecutor wrote investigators had identified 11 other potential victims but charges could not be filed on their behalf due to the statute of limitations.

Police arrested Jackson and extradited him from Idaho to Utah at the start of September 2023. Jackson pleaded no contest to the charges roughly two years later and was sentenced to five consecutive terms of 1-to-15 years in prison. He is currently incarcerated and not eligible for parole until 2030, though Jackson is appealing his sentence.

A person of interest in the Nancy Baird cold case

Serial killer Ted Bundy was executed in Florida in January of 1989. Days prior to his execution, Bundy granted an interview to a detective from Utah. Bundy confessed to the killings of Utah teens Debra Kent and Nancy Wilcox, but denied any knowledge of Nancy Baird.

That denial did not convince investigators at the time. Bundy remained the focus of the Baird case until COLD published the details of Bundy's alibi in 2023. Since that time, the Davis County Sheriff's Office has refocused its investigation on Thomas Jackson. As first reported by KSL, deputies excavated Jackson's former backyard during the spring of 2025 in search of Baird's body. That effort did not result in the discovery of any human remains.

Jackson's daughters said they grew up hearing their father brag about working a Ted Bundy case.

"My dad would also say, 'Oh, I was one of the last ones to see [Baird] before [Bundy] took her," Riddle said.

Holmberg and Riddle now question whether Jackson might've used Bundy as a scapegoat to conceal his own actions. Their mother, Geraldine O'Farrell, told COLD she is unsure what to think of the suggestion her ex-husband might've murdered Baird.

"I don't know him as having done physical violence," O'Farrell said. "Five years ago would I have thought he did? Probably no. But now, I don't know."

O'Farrell told COLD she believed Jackson, along with the other officers of the East Layton Police Department, frequently flirted with Baird at the gas station where she worked along U.S. 89. During Jackson's interview with COLD, Jackson said he believed Baird's abductor might have been one of his fellow former East Layton officers, a man named David Ray Anderson, who interacted with Baird at the gas station minutes before she was last seen.

"This person must've been someone she knew and had some trust in," Jackson said. "All I could see was just somebody she knew, and then bam, took her."

COLD has reached out to Jackson to seek clarification about his actions on the day of Baird's disappearance. Jackson has not responded.

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