Jail for D.C. man in murder without body

A Southeast Washington man has been sentenced to 20 years to life in prison for the 1999 murder of his girlfriend, although the victim’s body has never been found.

D.C. Superior Court judge Judge Michael L. Rankin on Friday sentenced Terrence Barnett, 45, to the maximum sentence in connection with the murder of Yolanda Baker, Barnett's girlfriend and mother of his twin children, who were five years old when their mother disappeared.

A jury in March convicted Barnett of second-degree murder in the nearly 11-year-old cold case after prosecutors said Barnett killed Baker after an abusive six-year relationship.

The Baker case is only the fourth murder case to be handled by the U.S. attorney’s office for the District in which a body was never found since the 1980s, according to prosecutors within the office.

-- Keith L. Alexander