A superior court judge on Tuesday, May 6, sentenced Sarah Dayan, 39, to 68 years and six months in prison for the 2020 murder of Keith Huss at Turnagain Pass and a series of related crimes in Anchorage and Seward, the State of Alaska Department of Law announced in a press release.
On Dec. 23, following a seven-week trial, Dayan was convicted of 15 crimes including second-degree murder, manslaughter, one count of burglary, one count of being a felon in possession of a concealable firearm, four counts of theft or attempted theft, three counts of vehicle theft, and three counts of violating a condition of release while on bail.
On May 6, Superior Court Judge Michael Wolverton sentenced Dayan to serve 50 years in prison for the second-degree murder charge, “finding the Manslaughter convictions merged, and consecutive sentences totaling 18 years and six months for the remaining crimes,” the release states. In total, Dayan will serve 68 years and six months in prison and, if released, will be placed on supervised probation for 10 years with an additional 30 years of suspended time.
According to the release, Judge Wolverton “specifically” found that Dayan “executed” Huss, who was appointed by a judge to be her third-party custodian as a condition of her release on bail from Wildwood Correctional Complex in Kenai on Sept. 28, 2020, “hours” after her release from jail. Further, Wolverton “did not find aspects of Dayan’s trial testimony credible” and, in imposing sentence, found “no mitigating factors and two aggravating factors” — that the murder was a crime of domestic violence and that Dayan employed a dangerous instrument “in furtherance of the murder.” Wolverton also found that the remaining charges were all “worst offenses.”
The case was prosecuted by Assistant Attorneys General Daniel Shorey and Tyler Jones of the Office of Special Prosecutions, with the assistance of Paralegal Aryel Dilley and Law Office Assistant Olivia Fowler. Alaska State Trooper Sgt. Mark Pearson led the investigation.
