Atlanta woman sentenced in SC murder case

GREER, S.C. (AP) — An Atlanta woman is facing a 50-year prison sentence for arranging the double murder of a Greer-area couple.

Solicitor Barry Barnette says 40-year-old Yesenia Cortez-Ramirez pleaded guilty to accessory before the fact of first-degree burglary and two counts of accessory after the fact of murder. She was sentenced Friday.

Cortez-Ramirez is one of eight people charged in connection in the January 2009 murders of 24-year-old Hugo Del Carmen Lugo-Hernandez and 21-year-old Teresa De Jesus Avilla-Martinez, 21.

Both were tortured and shot many times inside their home. Sheriff’s deputies found the bodies after receiving a call for help from a concerned family member.

Barnette says the violence erupted out of a business dispute between Lugo-Hernandez and a co-defendant.

Authorities are searching for two Georgia men still wanted on murder charges.