Slayer’S 80-Year Sentence Affirmed First Ruling Questioned

Curtis S. Buckner, the first man convicted in Washington by genetic evidence, got out of prison briefly Thursday on his 31st birthday - but he’ll soon go back to finish an 80-year sentence.

Stevens County Superior Court Judge Larry Kristianson resentenced Buckner to the same term he got in 1989 for raping and murdering Chewelah resident Cynthia Ferguson.

The state Supreme Court ruled last August that Kristianson had based the original sentence on improper reasoning. State law requires judges to demonstrate several special circumstances before exceeding sentencing guidelines, which called for Buckner to get 24 to 32 years.

Kristianson failed to cite enough evidence for his finding that Buckner constituted a future danger as a sex offender, the high court said. Nor did the trial judge rule out the possibility that Buckner could be rehabilitated with sex offender treatment.

The Supreme Court also faulted Kristianson for padding Buckner’s sentence to take away good-time credits before he could earn them. Kristianson stated in 1989 that he had designed Buckner’s sentence to keep him behind bars until he is 75 years old even if he would get a one-third reduction for good behavior.

This time, Kristianson made no such statement. Instead, he justified the 80-year sentence on grounds that the crime was deliberately cruel, that there were multiple injuries - Ferguson was stabbed 15 times - and that the victim was particularly vulnerable because she was driving a vehicle when Buckner attacked her.

Four of Ferguson’s friends and relatives urged Kristianson to reimpose a long sentence.

Prosecutor Jerry Wetle said most of the 40 to 45 spectators in the courtroom Thursday were Ferguson’s friends and family members, but about a half-dozen of Buckner’s relatives also attended.

Defense attorney John Troberg said afterward that he believes the genetic evidence used to convict Buckner greatly overstated the likelihood that Buckner’s DNA matched that in semen found in the victim’s body. He also believes a non-DNA blood test eliminated Buckner as a suspect.

A state appellate court ordered a new trial on grounds that DNA experts had testified improperly that there was only one chance in 19 billion that the semen came from someone other than Buckner. The court said the claim amounted to an impermissible statement that Buckner was guilty because there aren’t 19 billion people on Earth.

But the Supreme Court overturned the appellate court on the DNA issue and rejected a new trial. Troberg said he thinks Buckner eventually may take his DNA argument to federal court.

Meanwhile, though, all that can be appealed in state courts is the new sentence. That will be done, Troberg said.