South Carolina Man Pleads Guilty to 1998 East Hampton Murder

A South Carolina man charged with murder of a 60-year-old woman who was found dead in a stream on East Hampton in 1998 pleaded guilty to strangling the victim, Connecticut State Police said. 

Gerald Brian Tuttle pleaded guilty in Middlesex Superior Court to one count of first-degree manslaughter and one count of sexond-degree kidnapping, police said. 

On January 12, 1998, East Hampton police responded to a stream just off of Tartia Road, an area known as Engel’s Falls, after receiving a report that a woman’s body had been found.

The victim, Gertrude Ochankowski, was pronounced dead at the scene.

She had been reported missing hours earlier, when her car was found running in the front parking lot of 82 Main Street in East Hampton.   Witnesses said they saw her car running as early as 9:30 p.m. on January 11, 1998 and her dog was inside.

Tuttle, 51, was arrested on in 2013 at his home in Surfside Beach, South Carolina, and charged as a fugitive from justice. 

Sentencing for Tuttle is schedule for Dec. 6, 2016, where he is expected to be ordered to serve 30 years in prison, followed by five years probation.

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