Ryan Duke was acquitted of the murder of Tara Grinstead last week but convicted of concealing her body for more than a decade. Though he received the maximum sentence allowed, he's already eligible for parole in the case.
Ryan Duke testified that his friend Bo Dukes is the one responsible for Tara Grinstead's 2005 death. A jury found him not guilty of murder, but convicted him of concealing a death.
Ryan Duke testified that he had been passed out near the toilet of his mobile home in the early morning hours of Oct. 23, 2005 when his close friend Bo Dukes woke him up and confessed to killing high school teacher Tara Grinstead.
Ryan Duke, a former student of Tara Grinstead, allegedly confessed to murdering the victim after a former roommate told police he'd helped Duke "cremate" the body in a pecan tree field.
It took a jury less than an hour to convict Bo Dukes on charges related to the death of Grinstead, whose murder was the subject of the popular podcast "Up and Vanished."
Prosecutors played a taped conversation Bo Dukes had with an investigator in 2017, in which he admits helping Ryan Duke dispose of Tara Grinstead's body after her 2005 murder.
Prosecutors say Ryan Duke killed Tara Grinstead after breaking into her home to steal money for drugs, then enlisted his friend Bo Dukes to help him move the body and burn it in a pecan orchard.
Ryan Duke and Bo Dukes were charged in relation to the disappearance and murder of Tara Grinstead, the former beauty queen whose case is being explored by “Up And Vanished.”
Tara Grinstead’s personal life came under scrutiny in the investigation of her disappearance and presumed murder — including her relationship to former student Anthony Vickers.
