By Duncan Adams
981-3324
The murder case in Bedford County once attracted the attention of the Nancy Grace tabloid TV show and other national media because of the age disparity between the elderly victim and the girlfriend who allegedly killed him.
But the case ended quietly and abruptly Tuesday morning when Kristina N. Pongracz, 29, pleaded no contest in Bedford County Circuit Court to second-degree murder in connection with the beating death last year of her 77-year-old beau in his Bedford County home.
Judge James Updike found Pongracz guilty of second-degree murder and ordered a pre-sentencing investigation. Pongracz could face five to 40 years in prison and a fine of not more than $100,000. She remains jailed.
Authorities said Pongracz severely beat William Herchenrider with his cane at his large home in Goodview on May 4, 2010. He survived the initial beating and was found bleeding profusely and on all fours when a sheriff's deputy arrived at the house.
Pongracz was arrested the next day.
Herchenrider spent months recovering in the hospital and at an acute care facility. Then, on Aug. 25, 2010, just hours after his return home, Herchenrider died while in hospice care, Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Stephanie Ayers said.
Prosecutors initially charged Pongracz with felony aggravated malicious wounding. But after Herchenrider's death and related autopsy findings that ruled the death a homicide - tied to complications from the beating - the state also charged Pongracz with first-degree murder.
Her trial had been scheduled for Tuesday but earlier this month was postponed until March. Ayers said Tuesday that discussions with Pongracz and her attorney, public defender Webster Hogeland, had established the possibility of a plea to a lesser charge and set a related deadline of Tuesday.
Ayers said family members of Herchenrider had supported the plea agreement. And she said proving that the killing was premeditated might have been challenging for the prosecution had the case gone to trial.
Ayers said she thought the forensic evidence that linked Herchenrider's ultimate death to the beating was strong.
Sheriff's Deputy Chris Brown testified in October 2010 that when he responded to Herchenrider's home he found Pongracz passed out in her underwear with "a large amount of blood smeared all over her body" - blood that turned out to be Herchenrider's.
Authorities have alleged that Pongracz beat Herchenrider because he wanted to kick her out of his 3,730-square-foot home on about 19 acres in Goodview. Herchenrider once served as an executive for Delta Star Inc. in Lynchburg, Ayers has said.
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