Snelson found guilty

Photo: Contributed

A jury has once again found Neil George Snelson guilty of manslaughter in the 1993 killing of a Jennifer Cusworth – an Okanagan College student in Kelowna.

The death of 19-year-old Jennifer Cusworth went unsolved for more than 15 years, until Snelson was arrested in 2009 when new DNA evidence linked him to her body.

At the time, he admitted to having sex with her at a house party – the last place she was seen alive until her body was found beaten and strangled a few days later. Snelson denied killing her.

This time around, it took the jury only one day of deliberations before finding Snelson guilty once again of manslaughter.

A jury began deliberating in Kamloops on Tuesday morning and found Neil Snelson guilty the same night.

After the verdict on Tuesday, Cusworth's father said he is not hoping for a specific sentence for Snelson, but instead believes he will receive "spiritual justice."

Snelson was initially convicted of manslaughter in 2011 after being found not guilty of both first and second degree murder.

He was sentenced to 15 years in prison, but won an appeal shortly thereafter by arguing that the judge in the case should have withheld some of the Crown’s evidence from the jury.

In June 2014 Snelson was released on bail on a $75,000 surety pending his second trial.

His sentencing hearing is set to be scheduled on Monday. 

For previous Castanet stories on Neil George Snelson click here. 

– with files from The Canadian Press