Friday, February 3, 2012

Great Bend man will be sentenced April 2 for the death of a 15-year-old girl he injected with morphine.

Thirty-one-year-old Joseph Rykiel pleaded no contest Wednesday to involuntary manslaughter for the death of Jessica Cheyanne Shearer.

He admitted that he injected the girl with morphine on July 4, 2011 and she died later that day. Three other charges were dropped.

Barton County Attorney Doug Matthews says Rykiel rented the basement of a home where the girl died. He says Rykiel used a morphine prescription for one of the home's occupants to inject Shearer at least twice.

Rykiel met the girl two days before she died. She had left the Barton County Youth Care home for girls shortly just days before her death.