Dartmouth Woman Gets Life Sentence for Killing Man, Burying Body

A Dartmouth woman will spend the rest of her life in prison after she was convicted of killing a man in Florida, and then burying him in her grandmother's backyard.

The Pensacola News Journal reports that 24-year-old Desiree Tedder was found guilty of first-degree murder in the March 30, 2017 death of 23-year-old Drulmauert Mims.

Tedder claimed she had bludgeoned and stabbed Mims in self-defense after Mims had raped Tedder and her girlfriend, Lizmary Rodriguez. The murder occurred in Tedder's grandmother's house in Pensacola, where she and Rodriguez were living. Tedder testified that she and Rodriguez paid for their $500-a-day heroin habit by prostituting themselves.

Mims came to the grandmother's house on March 29, 2017, and had sex with Tedder and Rodriguez after they took drugs. Tedder testified that after she stopped giving consent, Mims then raped her. She claimed she then hit him in the head with a crowbar she kept by her bed and continued to hit him after he tried to get up. She then grabbed a kitchen knife and stabbed him in the chest and neck.

Tedder said she did it to protect herself, her girlfriend and her grandmother because Mims had a gun with him. Rodriguez, meanwhile, testified that Tedder told her she killed Mims because she was "broke," and that they had kept his money, drugs, and gun, as well as his backpack.

Tedder and Rodriguez wrapped Mims' body in blankets and a tarp, and placed him in a trash can outside the home. Several days later, Mims' family came looking for him, at which time Tedder buried both Mims and the trash can in the backyard.

Nine days after Mims was reported missing, Tedder was treated for a gunshot wound at St. Luke's in New Bedford after she and Rodriguez had returned to Massachusetts. Police also found marijuana and pills in her backpack. Rodriguez ultimately confessed to police and told them where to find Mims' body, and Tedder was arrested and extradited to Florida, where she was ordered held without bail.

Following the guilty verdict, Tedder was sentenced to a mandatory life sentence.