Harrisonville, MO – A jury in Cass County took just 90 minutes to settle on a sentence for Kylr Yust, recommending he get the maximum sentence on each of the guilty verdicts they handed down the day before.
For the guilty verdict of voluntary manslaughter for killing 17 -year-old Kara Kopetsky, they recommended the maximum sentence of 15 years in prison. For the count of second degree murder for killing 21-year-old Jessica Runions, they recommended life in prison.
Kopetsky went missing on May 4, 2007, from Belton High School, south of Kansas City, just days after a restraining order against Yust. Runions was last seen leaving a house party with a drunken Yust on the night of September 8, 2016. The remains of both Kara and Jessica were found near each other in a wooded area of Cass County by a mushroom hunter in 2017.
Cass County Circuit Judge William Collins said Yust’s sentencing will take place at 2:30 p.m. June 7. Collins will decide if the sentences run concurrently. Under sentencing guidelines, Yust would eventually be eligible for parole.