Anderson County District Attorney General Dave Clark is seeking the death penalty for two people alleged to have tortured and murdered 36-year-old Jennifer Gail Paxton in Oak Ridge.
He filed the notice of intent to seek the death sentence to the court on Monday, a news release from his office stated. The release states the alleged murder took place in December 2019 and officers with a search warrant found the body eight months later in August 2020.
Sean Finnegan, 54, and Rebecca Dishman, 23, are charged with first degree murder, aggravated rape, aggravated kidnapping, abuse of a corpse and tampering with evidence. They’ve remained in the Anderson County jail in Clinton since their arrest in August 2020, according to the release and the jail website.
In the release, Clark outlined the legal factors that allowed him to seek the death penalty against Dishman and Finnegan. Specifically, the release stated the murder was “especially heinous, atrocious or cruel in that it involved torture or serious physical abuse beyond what was necessary to produce death.” The legal factors also included that Dishman and Finnegan had allegedly committed the murder for the purpose of avoiding or interfering with being arrested for aggravated kidnapping and rape; they had a “substantial role” in the alleged aggravated kidnapping and aggravated rape; and they “knowingly mutilated the body of the victim.”
Making this a death penalty case initiates special procedures, Clark said in the release. Finnegan and Dishman will get a death penalty qualified attorney and the right to a second attorney.
The case is next scheduled to be in court on March 4. Criminal Court Judge Steve Sword of Knox County will preside over the case. Anderson County Circuit and Criminal Court Judge Ryan Spitzer withdrew as judge in the cases based on his involvement as a prosecutor before Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee made him a judge.
Oak Ridge police found Paxton’s body in August 2020 at a home in which Paxton, Dishman and Finnegan reportedly lived. Warrants state the alleged crimes against Paxton, which resulted in her death, occurred “after Dec. 23, 2019.”
In early August 2020, Oak Ridge police found Paxton’s body at a residence on East Fairview Road. In warrants, Oak Ridge Police Department Sgt. A. Marvell Moore stated that Finnegan and Dishman “lured the victim (Paxton) to the home with the promise of giving her a place to stay.”
In the warrants, Sgt. Moore alleged Paxton, once at the home was “held against her will,” chained to a bed, shackled with a dog collar and her arms were bound with zip ties. Then, Finnegan and Dishman reportedly struck Paxton on the head with a baseball bat and struck her arm to “incapacitate” her.
“Once incapacitated, (Dishman and Finnegan) repeatedly raped the victim before finally using a ligature to strangle the victim and cause her to die,” he stated in the warrants.
Moore described the victim as “tortured” and “deprived of food and medical care.”
He said after strangling the woman, the two defendants cut off a portion of at least one of her breasts and her nose, and broke her bones and ligaments to fit her body in a stand-up freezer.
Moore stated that Finnegan knew an investigation was forthcoming and he moved Paxton’s frozen, decomposing body from a freezer in his bedroom and hid the body under his bed and cleaned the interior of the freezer to remove any physical evidence.
Moore said Dishman confessed to using bleach and a Swiffer to clean up blood and other bodily fluids from the living room and bedroom floors and also used bleach and the bathroom shower to wash the body of evidence.
In the affidavit of complaint on the warrants, Moore said Finnegan and Dishman confessed to the aggravated kidnapping, first-degree murder and tampering with evidence charges after being read their rights.
After the Miranda Rights were read to her, Dishman reportedly confessed to sexual battery while Finnegan confessed to aggravated rape. Dishman also reportedly confessed to abusing the corpse.
Dishman and Finnegan were also indicted on multiple charges of rape and exploitation of a child between May 1 and May 7, 2020 in what Anderson County Deputy District Attorney Tony Craighead has said is a separate case. Clark’s news release on the death penalty does not mention this other set of charges.
Ben Pounds is a staff reporter for The Oak Ridger. Call him at (865) 441-2317, email him at bpounds@oakridger.com and follow him on Twitter @Bpoundsjournal.
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