LEWISBURG, W.Va. – A man who recently pleaded guilty to killing his newlywed wife during a Thanksgiving Day 2022 altercation will spend the rest of his life in prison.
Zachary Hess Dawson, 37, was sentenced today in Greenbrier County Circuit Court to life without the possibility of parole in the brutal beating death of his new wife, Marissa Dawson, in Alderson, just one month after they were married.
According to the Circuit Court Clerk’s office, Dawson pleaded guilty to murder in the first degree, which is open-ended as far as the length of the sentence.
Previous reports on the murder said the victim was the mother of five children and Zachary Dawson admitted to the beating, which started after an argument on Thanksgiving night. Her children were not at home at the time of the murder.
Dawson was arrested the day after Thanksgiving driving Marissa Dawson’s car in Lewisburg and told police at the time that he had killed his wife.
He remains incarcerated at Southern Regional Jail but at some point will be transferred to another prison.
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