VAN NUYS, Calif. (KNX) — A television producer charged with killing her sister seven years ago pleaded no contest Wednesday to voluntary manslaughter.
Jill Blackstone, 59, was sentenced to eight years in state prison in connection with her plea to one felony count of voluntary manslaughter for the death of her 49-year-old sister, Wendy Blackstone, in Studio City, along with three felony counts of animal cruelty resulting in the death of two dogs.
Police said Blackstone, a producer for shows like The Jerry Springer Show and Divorce Court, set the garage of her Studio City home on fire, killing her sister and two dogs residing on the property, and staged it as an accident.
A coroner concluded that Wendy Blackston died from smoke inhalation and consuming alprazolam, a sedative.
Blackstone was arrested three years after the incident, at which time L.A. police theorized “the motive was Jill’s frustration of being forced to provide Wendy long-term care, as well as the associated financial hardship,” according to a statement.
Blackstone told police in 2015 that her sister had vision and hearing loss.
“My client [pleaded] no contest clearly to abate her exposure to dying” while in prison, despite the prosecution not having “a solid proof of the cause of death,” Blackstone’s defense attorney told City News Service. Jill Blackstone reportedly suffers from Parkinson’s disease and is confined to a wheelchair.
Prosecutors alleged Blackstone had planned what was supposed to be a murder-suicide after police found a note at the scene of her sister’s death advising that “both parites have do not resuscitate orders” and another identifying the hair color of each of the two. Superior Court Judge James Brandolino agreed that the notes left at the seen “clearly support” the theory that Wendy Blackstone’s death was part of a murder-suicide plan gone “awry.”
Blackstone could have faced a life sentence had she been convicted on murder — but that charge was dismissed as a condition of her no-contest plea.
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