ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, June 7, 1996 TAG: 9606070042
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: PULASKI
Betty J. Woolridge will serve 11 years in prison for stabbing her live-in boyfriend to death the night of Feb. 10, 1995, a judge has ruled.
Pulaski County Commonwealth's Attorney Everett Shockley said Woolridge was sentenced Wednesday in Circuit Court to 30 years in prison with 19 suspended. Shockley said under current law Woolridge will serve at least nine years and four months of the 11 years. She then will be on supervised probation for 10 years, he said.
The 44-year-old woman has been in jail since May 1995 when her bond was revoked.
Woolridge was convicted of the second degree murder of Rickey Douglas Rakes, 38, who was living with her at the River Bend Trailer Park in the New River section of the county.
When officers arrived at the trailer, they found Rakes with multiple stab wounds. Rakes died soon after at Carilion Radford Community Hospital.
Woolridge had told police that Rakes beat her and she defended herself with a kitchen knife.
Other people in the trailer the night of the slaying said Rakes was lying in bed when Woolridge went to awaken him and the incident occurred.
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