A deranged Colorado worker will spend decades behind bars for fatally shooting his former boss’s wife when he was fired from his job while out on parole.
Ernest Cunningham, 53, was sentenced to 42 years in prison on Friday after he was convicted in the June 2024 killing of Kelsey Roberts-Gariety, according to Denver District Attorney John Walsh.
“Kelsey Roberts was a young woman with her whole life ahead of her who would be with us today were it not for Ernest Cunningham,” Walsh said.
“Today’s sentence ensures that Cunningham will pay a heavy price for his horrific actions.”
Before the killing, Cunningham was on parole from a 20-year burglary sentence and was working for Roberts-Gariety’s husband.
Roberts-Gariety’s husband Jack fired Cunningham for using drugs at work in the weeks before the murder, according to an arrest affidavit obtained by the Denver Post. It was not revealed what the pair did for work.
Furious over being fired, Cunningham began calling Roberts-Gariety’s husband to threaten him and had previously shown up uninvited at their apartment.
Cunningham went to confront Jack on the night of the murder, but instead shot Roberts-Gariety when she answered the front door. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
After his wife’s death, Jack Gariety told police that Cunningham “knew where they lived and had issues with him,” the Denver Post reported.
Surveillance footage also showed the parolee’s car leaving the building moments after the shooting.
A parole officer labeled Cunningham “low risk” two months before the murder despite two failed drug tests and two missed tests in the four months before the assessment, 9News reported.
The Colorado Department of Corrections has since recognized serious flaws in its screening process for some of the state’s most dangerous offenders.
Roberts-Gariety’s sister, Kylie Al-Nubu’at, said she believes if Cunningham had never been released, “she might still be here.”
“He was released and he made a permanent decision,” Al-Nubu’at told 9News, noting that her sister was murdered on her birthday and their family has struggled with her death every day since.
The 23-year-old was one of nine siblings.
However, she said the lengthy prison sentence given to her sister’s 53-year-old killer brought her and her family a measure of relief.
“When I heard the amount, I was very happy because I told myself if it’s over 20 (years) it’s basically a life sentence for him,” Al-Nubu’at said.
“He took my sister’s life. We’re serving a life sentence of grief, so now I feel like justice has been served.”
