By Jake Dye

Homer Independent Press

More than six years after the disappearance of Anesha “Duffy” Murnane in Homer, and nearly four years after a man in Utah was arrested on charges of kidnapping and murdering her, 36-year-old Kirby Calderwood pled guilty to a single charge of second-degree murder for her death on Thursday. He  faces 87 years in prison.

Murnane, then 37, went missing Oct. 17, 2019, while she walked from her home at MainTree Housing on Main Street to a doctor’s appointment at Seldovia Village Tribe Health Clinic on East End Road. Friends and family started extensive searches in the Homer area through the fall and into the next year. 

A Homer Presumptive Death Jury declared Murnane dead June 17, 2021, determining her death was most likely a homicide. Homer Police on May 7, 2022, said Calderwood abducted Murnane while she walked on Pioneer Avenue and took her to an unoccupied Homer house where he assaulted and killed her.

On Thursday, Calderwood appeared at the Kenai Courthouse to change a not guilty plea that he entered on Nov. 11, 2022. His attorney, Michael Moberly, read a plea agreement into the record. In exchange for pleading guilty to murder in the second-degree, the eight other charges against Calderwood — including first-degree murder, two further counts of second-degree murder, two counts of kidnapping, tampering with physical evidence, manslaughter and first-degree sexual assault — will be dismissed. 

“He’s obviously making a big decision,” Moberly said. “That decision is based upon a lot of time and reflection, review of discovery, discussions with counsel.”

Under the agreement, which has been viewed by the Homer Independent Press, Calderwood will be sentenced to 87 years active imprisonment. He will be eligible for discretionary parole after two thirds of that time — roughly 58 years, when he will be more than 90 years old. Calderwood has been imprisoned at Wildwood Pretrial Facility since being extradited in November 2022 from Ogden, Utah, where he moved after living in Homer. 

An attachment to the plea agreement includes what Moberly called “stipulated facts,” to which Calderwood cited in pleading guilty. That accounting of events largely lines up with previous reporting and the criminal complaint, saying that Calderwood knew Murnane from when he worked at MainTree Housing and picked her up in a vehicle before taking her to an unoccupied home where he assaulted and killed her before later disposing of her body.

“As a part of this factual basis for the plea agreement,” the document reads, “Calderwood specifically admits and stipulates that intending to cause serious physical injury, or with no knowledge that his conduct was substantially certain to cause death or serious physical injury to Murnane, he caused Murnane’s death” — one of the criteria for second-degree murder under Alaska law.

The case broke in April 2022 when a person who knew Calderwood made a Crimestoppers tip and alleged that Calderwood told them about the abduction. The person later talked to special investigator Matt Haney, a former Homer police officer who after his career in Homer gained experience in missing and murdered persons investigations.

Superior Court Judge Kelly Lawson asked Calderwood to voice his understanding to each of the terms of the agreement. Calderwood said that he gave up his right to appeal, to seek a sentence reduction and to receive a trial. He affirmed that he entered into the plea agreement voluntarily, without coercion and in full understanding of its implications. He confirmed that the facts of the case  as described in the plea agreement were correct.

To the charge of murder in the second degree, Calderwood pled “Guilty, your honor.”

A sentencing hearing was scheduled to be held in Homer on July 1 at 10:30 a.m.