A campaign aide pled guilty to killing former Arkansas Senator Linda Collins before trying to recruit female inmates, while in custody  to kill the victim’s ex-husband, as well as a judge and prosecutor linked to her murder trial.
Rebecca Lynn O’Donnell, 49, pled guilty on Thursday to first-degree murder and abuse of a corpse in the June 2019 death of the state senator.
O’Donnell also pled no contest to two counts of criminal solicitation in a separate case where she was charged with asking fellow inmates to kill Collins’ ex-husband and two others while she was in jail.
She was sentenced to 50 years in prison under a deal with prosecutors.
Collins, who went by Collins-Smith in the Legislature, was found stabbed to death last year outside her home in Pocahontas, which is about 130 miles northeast of Little Rock.
The victim’s son and father found her body wrapped in a blanket under a tarp in her driveway.

O’Donnell [right] on Thursday admitted to intentionally killing her friend Collins [left], and then hiding her body. She had worked on Collins’ unsuccessful reelection campaign in 2018 and was a witness in the former lawmaker’s divorce proceedings

At trial in April, prosecutors said O’Donnell confessed the motive was money. She was originally charged with capital murder and prosecutors last year indicated that  they planned to seek the death penalty.
She changed her initial plea of not guilty to enter a guilty plea during the court hearing on Thursday, before she was sentenced.
O’Donnell admitted to intentionally killing her friend and then hiding her body.
O’Donnell and Collins were known to be friends before the slaying.
She had worked on Collins’ unsuccessful reelection campaign in 2018 and was a witness in the former lawmaker’s divorce proceedings. Collins divorced retired Circuit Judge Philip Smith in 2018.

After Collins’ body was discovered, investigators determined that she had last been seen alive on May 28 – just days before she was found.
Video footage from Collins’ security system showed O’Donnell removing security cameras from inside the former lawmaker’s residence that same day she was last seen alive.
After O’Donnell was arrested and jailed, she was accused of plotting more killings. She reportedly tried to recruit female inmates at her prison to help kill the victim’s ex-husband retired judge Phil Smith.

O’Donnell [left] also pleaded no contest to two counts of criminal solicitation in a separate case where she was charged with asking fellow inmates to kill Sen. Collins’ ex-husband, Phil Smith [right], and two others while she was in jail 

After O’Donnell [photo] was arrested and jailed, she was accused of trying to recruit female inmates at her prison to help kill prosecutor Henry Boyce and judge Harold Erwin

Boyce and Erwin who had been overseeing the trial, both recused themselves from the case.
‘No amount of punishment will ever fill that void that Rebecca O’Donnell made in our lives the day she killed our mother,’ Tate Williams, Collins’ daughter, said after the hearing.
‘Today we find some shred of peace that Rebecca O’Donnell will be put away in prison for a very long time, unable to hurt anyone else.’
Collins’ son, Butch Smith, who found his mother’s body outside her home, said: ‘The plea deal was not what my first choice would have been, but at least we do have a guaranteed amount of time that she will be imprisoned for and we will have the ability as the victim’s family to argue against her release at her parole hearings.’