A Springfield man pleaded guilty to first-degree murder last week in the killing of a Clark County woman in a plot allegedly orchestrated by the victim’s husband, The Columbian reported.
Darrell E. Riley, 57, broke into Lindy Rummell’s Brush Prairie home on March 23, 2024, shot her five times and “staged” the scene to look like an interrupted burglary, according to the Clark County Sheriff’s Office.
Investigators said the victim’s husband, James Rummell, 51, picked up Riley in Eugene and took him to Clark County hours before the shooting. Riley and James Rummell had met years ago while both were serving sentences in an Oregon prison, authorities said.
Riley was arrested the day after the shooting when a Eugene friend of Riley’s told police that the alleged hitman had confessed to murdering a woman in Washington state, court records state.
James Rummell and two others found Lindy Russell dead in the Clark County house on the day after the murder. Detectives initially believed the case was a burglary gone wrong, as the house showed forced entry, and money and several personal items from the house were missing, as well as a black pickup truck.
The break in the case came after Riley contacted a friend to pick him up in Monroe in Benton County the night of the shooting, according to a 2024 probable cause affidavit.
When Riley and the friend met up, Riley took rifles and other items out of a black Ford F-150 and then set the truck on fire, the affidavit alleges. While driving back to Eugene, the friend said Riley told him that he had taken the items from the home of a woman he had killed and that he had staged the scene to look like a burglary, the affidavit states.
Riley allegedly told his friend that James Rummell had approached him about killing Rummell’s wife 10 months prior and promised him $35,000 from Lindy Rummell’s life insurance, according to the affidavit. Riley told his friend that he shot Lindy Rummell, 60, five times through a pillow to muffle the sound of the gunshots.
The friend told police he “did not want to be involved with this,” the affidavit states, and started thinking about a way out of it. He ultimately brought Riley back to his Eugene home that night, feeling alarmed when he realized Riley had multiple guns in his possession. After Riley fell asleep in a chair, the friend woke up his mother and got her and their dogs out of the house, court documents say. He later contacted police, explained the situation and told detectives the location of the burned truck.
Police arrested Riley the day after the shooting.
James Rummell initially told police he had spent the morning of the shooting on a long drive to clear his head and then spent the afternoon with a neighbor learning how to file taxes online before arriving home to find his wife dead in the house, court records state.
In a later interview, he changed his story, saying he’d gone to Eugene on the morning of the killing, picked up Riley, drove them both to Clark County and left Riley at a bus stop near his home, adding that he had no idea Riley was planning to kill his wife, according to the affidavit.
Clark County sheriff’s deputies arrested James Rummell on March 28, 2024, five days after the shooting.
James Rummell is awaiting trial on murder and other charges. Riley’s sentencing is set for August 21.
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