Letti Strait, a suspect in the homicide of her ex-husband, Charles Cammisano, has been sentenced to three years in prison for tax evasion.
A jury found Strait guilty in April for falsely claiming her children as dependents after the children had
been removed from her home and placed in the custody of the Missouri
Children's Division.
"The defendant's former husband was murdered on September 1,
2007," Platte County
prosecuting attorney Eric Zahnd said. "The defendant
remains a suspect in that murder. But this
case was about her outrageous and illegal claim that her children were
her dependents, when they had been taken from her custody the night her
former husband's body was found."
In 2007, Strait was arrested after a standoff
with police but was released. She and another man were named "persons of
interest" in Cammisano's slaying. No charges have been filed in
Cammisano's killing.
Zahnd was seeking two maximum sentences of five years each to run
consecutively, but Judge Abe Shafer sentenced Strait to three years in
prison.
"A 10-year sentence may seem like a long prison term," Zahnd said. "But
because Missouri has no truth-in-sentencing law, the sentencing report
in this case estimated that this defendant would serve only 18-23 months
in prison on a 10-year sentence. We are pleased the court sentenced
her to prison but expect she may serve only about six months of her
sentence behind bars."
Riverside police are still seeking tips about Cammisano's
killing. If you know something, call the Riverside PD at 816-741-1501 or
the TIPS Hotline at 816-474-8477.
Strait
has a prior federal conviction for conspiracy to
distribute cocaine.
Twitter @pitchplog.
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