Jul 17, 2014 3 min read

A Washington County judge ruled Wednesday that incriminating statements allegedly made by a Canonsburg man accused of killing his ex-girlfriend can be used in court.

Judge Katherine Emery filed her opinion late Wednesday denying the suppression of statements Jordan Clemons, 25, reportedly made Jan. 13, 2012, the night he turned himself in to police.

Clemons is accused of killing his former girlfriend, Karissa Kunco, 21, of Pittsburgh, in January 2012 and dumping her body in a wooded area of Mt. Pleasant Township. Kunco was last seen alive Jan. 11, 2012. State police allege that after killing her, Clemons dragged her naked body into the woods along Sabo Road and covered it with leaves, brush and a tree stump. Her throat was cut.

Clemons faces a host of charges, including criminal homicide, and the prosecution is seeking the death penalty.

Clemons’ attorney, Deputy Public Defender Brian Gorman, argued at a May suppression hearing the statements should be suppressed because state police violated Clemons’ right to remain silent and his right to counsel. He also argued that Clemons was intoxicated and/or incapacitated when police interviewed him.

First Assistant District Attorney Chad Schneider said one statement in question gives a detailed account of Clemons’ whereabouts the day Kunco was killed.

“He made the choice to speak,” Schneider said.

But Gorman argued his client was so intoxicated he failed to understand his rights and make a “voluntary and knowing waiver of his Miranda rights when the statement was given.” While Gorman acknowledges the fact Clemons had been drinking does not automatically “invalidate his subsequent incriminating statements,” he questions whether his client had “sufficient mental capacity” at the time.

“Mere recent imbibing or the existence of a hangover does not make his confession inadmissible, but only goes to the weight to be accorded to it. The determining factor is whether a confession was the product of an essentially free and unconstrained choice,” he argued

Emery, in her opinion, said, “The defendant’s statements made were unsolicited and made with no obligation. The question thus turns to whether the defendant’s statements demonstrated intent to waive his rights.”

Emery said Clemons “did manifest a desire to waive his rights to remain silent.”

“At no time did he express any confusion after the officer had explained his rights,” she said. “Further, no question about the victim’s death was ever posed to him. The defendant freely volunteered his statements. Only upon the request to sign the waiver did he invoke his right to an attorney.”

By doing that, Emery said Clemons showed he was aware of his rights and wished “to invoke his right to counsel.”

“Based on these facts, the court cannot find that the defendant understood only one of the rights explained to him,” she said in her opinion.

Emery also stated that Clemons was “not so intoxicated to render his statements involuntary.”

“The defendant was able to walk while handcuffed through the barracks at the direction of the troopers. He was responsive to the question asked to him (about waiving his rights), and he (later) asserted his right to counsel. … The defendant had the requisite mental capacity to render his statement voluntarily.”

In addition to criminal homicide, aggravated assault, access device fraud, abuse of a corpse, unauthorized use of a motor vehicle and tampering with evidence in the Kunco case, Clemons faces burglary, robbery, theft and simple assault charges in connection with a home invasion in Canonsburg Jan. 8, 2012, and a charge of flight to avoid apprehension in connection with an alleged assault of Kunco in December 2011.

Clemons remains in Washington County jail without bond.