MASCOTTE, Fla. — A 2-year-old murder case in Mascotte was closed Friday.
Johnny Shipman was sentenced to life in prison Friday for killing his estranged girlfriend, Kristi Delaney, in front of their 3-year-old daughter in November 2013.
The more than 200 pages of discovery include hundreds of pictures and two important interviews that helped put Shipman at the crime scene.
Investigators said Shipman stabbed Delaney to death and then called his sister for help.
His sister wasn’t available to come pick him up, so she sent her friend, Michelle Partridge, who did not know she was the getaway driver of a crime.
“When he got in my truck, I noticed he had his arm wrapped up,” Partridge told a detective.
She told the detective the towel has blood on it and that Shipman told her the blood was from a fight.
“He told me he got into a fight with some boys from Stucky over his girlfriend. I said, ‘Johnny, what is going on?’ And he said, ‘Man I got to get out of here. I got to get out of here,’” Partridge said.
Partridge drove him to Ocala, but the next morning she discovered Shipman’s story was a sham and that Delaney had been murdered.
Investigators said after the 3-year-old witnessed her mom’s murder, she walked two blocks to her grandmother’s for help.
When investigators arrived at the home, they found blood in the hall, in the kitchen and Delaney’s body next to the front door.
Partridge was not the only witness who linked Shipman to the murder.
Another person also drove Shipman that night and was outside Delaney’s home during the murder.
Mark Gaskins said Shipman made him drive to Delaney’s house on the night of the murder, but he waited in the car and had no idea what Shipman was up to.
“As soon as he had got inside the truck, he just said, ‘Let’s go.’ And he was, I mean, he was wired,” Gaskins said.
Gaskins was disturbed by Shipman’s behavior, so he dropped Shipman off at a gas station and drove away.
That’s when Partridge came to pick up him.
Shipman was on the run for several days until deputies tracked him down in Ocala.
He was supposed to go on trial in July, but this week both sides reached a plea deal, which will send Shipman to prison for the rest of his life.
Delaney’s parents have custody of her daughter.
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