Jennifer Stark Found Dead In Carlsbad Home
POSTED: 4:04 am PDT October 22, 2009
UPDATED: 6:23 am PDT October 22, 2009
SAN DIEGO -- A preliminary hearing is scheduled Thursday for a La Costa man accused of beating and slitting the throat of his on-again, off-again girlfriend, a popular court reporter at the Vista courthouse.
Jonathan Scott French, 40, is charged with the July 31 slaying of Jennifer Stark, a 43-year-old mother of two teenagers.
Prosecutors said Stark had dinner with French the night she was killed just to make sure he was "OK" after the two had broken up about a month earlier.
The couple was seen kissing at a Carlsbad restaurant and the victim appeared to be intoxicated, witnesses told authorities.
Video surveillance showed the couple leaving the restaurant at 9:56 p.m., with the victim's car left in the parking lot, prosecutors said.
Earlier, French had told an ex-girlfriend, "I loved Jen and Jen had not been faithful," prosecutors said.
At 11:20 p.m., Stark's 15-year-old son came home and found his mother's bloodied body in the hallway and called 911, according to prosecutors.
A further inspection of the body by detectives and a deputy medical examiner revealed a blackened, swollen eye, a broken nose, a blunt force injury to the forehead and a swollen lip, according to court documents.
A bloody 10- to 12-inch kitchen knife was found under the rug in the hallway, prosecutors said.
At 4:18 a.m. the next morning, French, a pharmaceutical supplies salesman, called deputies from a pay phone outside the Encinitas sheriff's substation and told them to come arrest him.
After Thursday's preliminary hearing, retired Contra Costa County Judge Peter Spinetta will decide if enough evidence was presented for French to stand trial. The defendant faces 26 years to life in prison if convicted.
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