BRIGHTON, Colo. — A 29-year-old woman was convicted Tuesday in the 2020 murder of her boyfriend, Colorado's 17th Judicial District Attorney's Office said.
Ashley White, 29, was found guilty of second-degree murder, conspiracy to commit second-degree murder and robbery in connection with the death of Cody DeLisa.
Adams County deputies found DeLisa unresponsive in a pool of blood on Aug. 14, 2020, after his employer and landlord requested a welfare check earlier that day because he hadn't answered his phone. Deputies found he was shot in the head.
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Colorado's 17th Judicial District Attorney's Office said White and DeLisa had a volatile and strained relationship, as DeLisa reportedly criticized White for her inability to get a full-time job. White wrote in her diary that she regretted ever meeting DeLisa, the DA said, and attempted to drown and burn DeLisa's cat.
On Aug. 13, 2020, White said she met a man named "Scott" on a bus ride home from a job interview. He asked if she was in a relationship and whether the man had raped her. White said he had and Scott told her the two of them must kill him.
Scott got off the bus with White and the two spent time shooting his gun, the DA said. They walked to White's home where Scott introduced himself to DeLisa as White's brother from Texas.
DeLisa was later found shot twice in the head.
Investigators identified White as a suspect and when questioned, she detailed the events leading up to DeLisa's death. She was then arersted and charged.
Three years after the shooting, a woman who said she was the girlfriend of a man named Michael Stratton reached out to Colorado's 17th Judicial District Attorney's Office. She said she believed her boyfriend was responsible for killing DeLisa, laying out Stratton's confession, which matched White's.
Stratton was already in custody at that time on suspicion of a separate murder of a Pueblo man, the DA said. He was deemed incompetent to stand trial in that case, and was not charged in Adams County for his suspected connection to DeLisa's murder.
White's trial began on Jan. 6, 2025 and lasted about three weeks before she was convicted. She is scheduled for sentencing on April 4 in Adams County District Court.
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