Guilty plea in Gunnison County

A woman will go to prison for tampering with a corpse — her murdered brother

A Gunnison County woman has pleaded guilty to tampering with a corpse after her brother’s bones were found buried beside a barrel filled with goat heads at a time when the family was feuding over a $3 million ranch.

In exchange for Stephaine Jackson’s guilty plea, prosecutors dismissed a murder charge against her in the shooting death of her 29-year-old brother, Jacob “Jake” Millison. She entered the plea on Sept. 6.

As part of the plea deal, prosecutors also dismissed 12 other charges against Jackson including corpse abuse, six counts of accessory to a crime, two counts of witness tampering and other charges, according to Gunnison County District Court records.

The plea calls for Jackson to serve 16 to 24 years in prison, said Sherry McKenzie, spokeswoman for the 7th Judicial District Attorney’s office. Jackson is scheduled for sentencing on Nov. 8. Jackson’s husband, David Jackson, faces sentencing on Oct. 11 following his conviction on the same charge.

Deborah Rudibaugh, Millison’s mother, already has been sentenced to 40 years in prison following her conviction for seconddegree murder after admitting she shot her son while he slept.

Millison’s murder was linked to the 700 acres of meadow land on the 7-11 Ranch near Gunnison, according to the arrest affidavit. Family members were feuding over ownership, it said.

Marion “Rudy” Rudibaugh, a World War II Navy diver, bought and managed the ranch and ran a prosperous hunting guide business for decades. He died in 2009 and left the ranch largely to Deborah Rudibaugh, his second wife, the affidavit said.

The criminal case was filed only after a chance encounter on the ranch and after Millison’s childhood friends and Gunnison residents pressed authorities to investigate his 2015 disappearance.

On June 27, 2017, an individual who would become a confidential informant drove to the ranch and found the Jacksons looking at something on the ground and shaking their heads, the affidavit said.

The skeletal remains of a rib cage protruded from a manure pit. Stephaine Jackson told the informant that her mother said the remains were those of a bear and that a wild animal had dug up the parts and carried away an arm, the affidavit said.

Stephaine Jackson loaded two scoops of manure from the pig pen into a front-loader and dumped them over the bones, the affidavit said. Later, she told the informant she believed the re

mains were of her brother and the secret needed to stay between them forever, it said.

The witness later went to the Gunnison County Sheriff’s Office and told investigators what he had seen, the affidavit said. When sheriff’s deputies dug up the pit, they found Millison’s skeletal remains, minus one arm, with a barrel full of sheep and goat heads, it said.

On July 17, 2017, Rudibaugh confessed to investigators that she used her Smith & Wesson .357 “Lady Smith” revolver to shoot her son, the affidavit said.

“I killed Jake,” she told investigators, according to the affidavit. “I shot him in the head.”