AKRON, Ohio (Court TV) — A Rittman mother, Erica Stefanko, was convicted on murder charges for the second time after an appeals court overturned her murder conviction in the death of Ashley Biggs.
The jury deliberated for more than eight hours over two days before finding Stefanko guilty of both charges she was facing. The judge scheduled sentencing for Thursday, Feb. 1, 2024. Under Ohio law, the mandatory sentence for aggravated murder is life without parole, and the mandatory sentence for murder is a sentence of 15 years to life.
Biggs, 25, went to work as a pizza delivery driver in Akron on June 20, 2012, and never returned home. Summit County prosecutors claim Stefanko placed a bogus pizza order that lured Biggs to a parking lot where Biggs was beaten and strangled to death by Chad Cobb, her ex-boyfriend and the father of her child. At the time, Biggs and Cobb were locked in a bitter custody dispute over their daughter, and Cobb was married to Stefanko.
Cobb pleaded guilty to Biggs’ murder in 2013. He later implicated Stefanko and became a critical state witness. But it was Cobb’s pandemic-era testimony via Zoom that overturned Stefanko’s conviction. If he takes the stand again, there’s no telling what he’ll say. In the first trial, he tried to distance himself from Biggs’ murder and denied killing her.
Cobb wasn’t the only person to implicate Stefanko in her first trial in 2020. The jury also heard from the teenage daughter of Biggs and Cobb, who testified that she overheard Stefanko place the pizza order using a false name. Cobb’s mother testified that she secretly recorded a conversation in which Stefanko admitted to placing the order and said that Cobb wanted Biggs’ skull as a trophy.
Cobb’s friend, Mary Brinkman, testified Stefanko made no secret of her dislike for Biggs. Stefanko said she drove Cobb to the ambush location, Brinkman testified, and later defecated on Biggs’ grave “for all the (expletive) she put us through.”
Stefanko’s defense argued that her contempt for Biggs was not evidence of involvement in a murder conspiracy. The defense tried to portray Cobb as a spiteful ex who implicated Stefanko after she divorced him and married Cobb’s best friend.
Stefanko nearly testified in her defense, then changed her mind at the last minute. It remains to be seen what she’ll do now that she has another chance to tell her side of the story.
A pizza delivery ends in death
According to trial testimony, Cobb and Biggs had a child together in July 2005. By 2012, they were leading separate lives except for a fiercely contested custody battle.
“I think things would have gone better if it were two parties instead of four,” Cobb’s mother, Cynthia Cobb, testified, referring to Chad and Ashley’s significant others. “I just think they both added fuel to the fire.”
Cobb met Stefanko — known then as Erica Lyon — on MySpace in 2006 and married her in 2010. The couple lived in Akron with their four children: two children they had together, Stefanko’s child from another relationship, and Cobb’s daughter with Biggs.
Biggs was working as a Domino’s Pizza delivery driver for extra money for the custody battle, her supervisor testified. On the night of June 20, 2012, someone called in an order to 647 W. Turkeyfoot Lake Rd. Biggs left shortly before midnight and never returned. Her supervisor called the police when Biggs failed to answer her phone.. Police arrived at Turkeyfoot Lake Rd. around 12:45 a.m. and found blood, drag marks, Taser parts and cash. Biggs and her car were missing.
Biggs’ fiancée, Brittany Dunson, was the first person to tell investigators about the tumultuous custody battle. The information led police to Cobb’s grandparent’s property around 4:30 a.m., where they found Stefanko and the four children in a car behind a barn. Police found Cobb hiding in the nearby woods covered in blood.
Later that morning, a passerby noticed Biggs’ car in a cornfield next and called police. Biggs’ body was found in the car with her arms, legs and neck bound with industrial-sized zip ties.
Stefanko allegedly told police that her husband returned home around 1 a.m. and told her to pack up the kids because they had to leave. They drove to Cobb’s grandparents’ home, Cobb got out of the car and said he would be back, Stefanko said.
Chadd Cobb's testimony
Prosecutors claim Cobb beat and strangled Biggs to death, then used Biggs’ car to transport her body to the cornfield, where Stefanko picked him up. Cobb told a slightly different story on the witness stand.
Cobb testified that he overheard Stefanko place the call from their car, then left him alone in the parking lot. Cobb did not explain why Stefanko made the call, if she did so at his behest, or why they were in the parking lot. He also denied killing Biggs.
“Is it fair to say that Ashley did not leave that parking lot alive that night?” Assistant Summit County Prosecutor Brian LoPrinzi asked him.
“Yes sir, that is accurate,” Cobb responded.
Cobb said he placed Biggs’ body in the backseat of her car, then called Stefanko, who followed him as he drove Biggs’ car to a cornfield.
Cobb pleaded guilty in February 2013 to 10 charges, including aggravated murder, kidnapping and robbery. In exchange, prosecutors dropped the death penalty. Cobb said his children also factored into his decision. If he lost parental rights, he feared his parents and grandparents would have no claim to his children either, exposing them to the possibility of entering the foster care system.
Cobb denied that his testimony was motivated by anger toward Stefanko for marrying his best friend, Christopher Michael Stefanko. Cobb claimed to have turned on Stefanko in 2017 when he was no longer able to see his children in prison.
Zoom testimony reverses conviction
Stefanko’s first trial took place in Summit County Court of Common Pleas in November 2020 with the COVID-19 pandemic in full swing. Some witnesses testified behind plastic partitions while others appeared remotely via Zoom — including Cobb, who testified from state prison wearing a mask over strenuous defense objections.
Both the prosecution and the defense objected to the trial going forward under those conditions, especially to witnesses testifying remotely.
The jury of six men and six women deliberated for three days before convicting Stefanko on Thanksgiving Eve of aggravated murder and murder. With their guilty verdicts, the jury found that Stefanko caused Biggs’ death “purposely, and with prior calculation and design.” The jury acquitted Stefanko of additional charges of murder, kidnapping and aggravated robbery, suggesting they rejected the prosecution’s argument that Stefanko caused Biggs’ death while committing or attempting to commit kidnapping, aggravated robbery, or felonious assault.
