Sweden to free woman convicted in Lake deputy's murder

<p>A Swedish woman who had been serving a life sentence for the 1981 murders of a Lake County sheriff's deputy and a Stockton restaurateur will be released in 2011, a Swedish court ruled Monday.</p><p>Annika Ostberg Deasy, who was transferred to a Swedish prison earlier this year, has made amends for her offense and is not expected to return to crime once she's released, the Orebro district court said.</p><p>The Swedish-born woman, who now goes by Ostberg, pleaded guilty in 1983 to two first-degree murder charges to avoid execution.</p><p>She was charged with being an accomplice to her boyfriend, who fired the fatal shots in 1981. He hanged himself in jail while awaiting trial.</p><p>Deasy was transferred to a Swedish prison to be closer to her family after her attorney in this country, Ashok Ramani, appealed to the state parole board early this year.</p><p>Ramani said Thursday he was pleased she would now be released.</p><p>"To me, Ms. Deasy is the epitome of how inmates who are determined can completely rehabilitate themselves during incarceration," he said.</p><p>Lake County District Attorney Jon Hopkins objected to the April transfer and predicted it would lead to her release.</p><p>"That was a foregone conclusion. The publicity generated by her supporters was based on a misconception of her role in the two killings that put her in prison," he said this week.</p><p>Deasy has been the subject of a documentary and numerous newspaper stories in Sweden, where she lived until she was 11 years old. Swedish schoolchildren wrote letters on her behalf.</p><p>Deasy was not the innocent bystander portrayed in some Swedish accounts of the 1981 killings, Hopkins said.</p><p>Deasy helped distract the victims, who were shot and killed by her boyfriend, Bob Cox, Hopkins said.</p><p>Ramani said her level of participation in the crimes is debatable and what matters now is that she has changed her life, he said.</p><p>The first killing was of a Stockton restaurateur to whom the pair had been selling meat.</p><p>The Lake County killing occurred while the two were fleeing the first.</p><p>They stopped in Lake County because Deasy wanted to see her son, but they became lost and a tire went flat on their vehicle.</p><p>When Lake County Sgt. Richard Helbush stopped to investigate, Cox told Deasy to show him her driver's license. Deasy did not have a driver's license and Cox knew that, Hopkins said.</p><p>While Helbush was watching Deasy rifle through her purse looking for the nonexistent license, Cox shot him three times in the back and once in the head, he said.</p><p>They took his wallet and gun and fled in his police car. They were arrested a short time later following a pursuit and shootout with law enforcement.</p><p>During the shootout, Deasy reloaded the guns for Cox, Hopkins said.</p><p>Deasy also had been convicted of being involved in a fatal stabbing in San Francisco in the 1970s when she was a young, single mother working as a prostitute.</p><p>Deasy's supporters say she turned her life around in prison and has helped other prisoners kick their drug addictions.</p><p>The Orebro court on Monday ruled that Deasy can have her life sentence reduced to 45 years. She was first imprisoned in 1981, and Swedish prisoners are normally released after serving two-thirds of their sentences. The court said this means she will be freed in 2011.</p><p>Swedish prosecutor Gunnar Brodin told local news agency TT he is considering appealing the decision.</p><p>A tearful Deasy testified last week about her crimes, saying she acknowledges the pain it has caused to the relatives of the victims and her family.</p><p>The Associated Press contributed to this story. You can reach Staff Writer Glenda Anderson at 462-6473 or glenda.anderson@pressdemocrat.com.</p>