Woman convicted in 1991 teen’s slaying released on parole

HARRISBURG » A woman convicted of helping a friend kill a teenage rival almost three decades ago in Pennsylvania has been released on parole.

The state Department of Corrections confirmed Tuesday that 45-year-old Tabitha Buck had been released on parole Saturday.

Buck, whose first name is spelled Tabatha in some court documents, was convicted in the December 1991 murder of 16-year-old Laurie Show in Lancaster County’s Lampeter Township. Investigators said she and Lisa Michelle Lambert killed the high school sophomore because Lambert saw Show as a romantic rival.

The murder formed the basis of a 2000 USA Network TV movie, “The Stalking of Laurie Show.”

Lambert, who was an adult at the time of the murder, is serving a life sentence without possibility of parole but continues to contest her conviction. Her boyfriend, Lawrence Yunkin, pleaded guilty to thirddegree murder and was paroled in 2004.

Buck, who was 17 at the time of the crime, was originally sentenced to life in prison but was re-sentenced in 2017 to 28 years to life following a U.S Supreme Court ruling barring mandatory life sentences for juvenile offenders.

LNP reports that under the terms of her parole, Buck cannot live or work in Lancaster County, must avoid any contact with Show’s family and must take psychiatric medication as prescribed by her doctor.

Defense attorney Chris Lyden said in arguing for a lesser sentence that his client had been under the influence of Lambert and since her conviction had been a “model prisoner.”