U.S. teenager charged with murder says co-defendant lied about schoolmate's killing

A teenager charged with murder said his 17-year-old co-defendant lied when she blamed him for killing a schoolmate whose body was found burned and dismembered earlier this year.

Sarah Kolb "made up a big story to make her look much better than she really is" during testimony earlier this month at her murder trial, Cory Gregory, 18, said in a jailhouse interview broadcast by WQAD and posted on the television station's Web site.

Gregory and Kolb have been charged with two counts of murder and one count of concealing a homicide in the Jan. 21 death of 16-year-old Adrianne Reynolds. Kolb is set for a re-trial on Feb. 6. Her first trial ended in a mistrial when jurors deadlocked 11-1 in favor of conviction.

During the two-week trial, Kolb testified that Gregory strangled Reynolds in Kolb's car outside a restaurant in Moline, Illinois, during their school lunch hour, then threatened to kill Kolb, her family and her cats if she told authorities.

Gregory, scheduled for trial Feb. 21, said he wasn't surprised his former girlfriend pinned the killing on him. "She's lying, but I figured she'd probably do something like that, she's trying to defend herself. I wish she would have told the truth," said Gregory. Kolb's attorney did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Kolb told jurors she was angry with Reynolds and had invited her to lunch to "talk things out" because Reynolds had gone on a recent date with Gregory, Kolb's ex-boyfriend. But she testified that she only yelled and pulled Reynolds' hair before Gregory pulled her into the back seat and killed her.

Gregory said he could not discuss specifics about Reynolds' death because of his pending trial, but he said "it was basically just a fight and it went too far."

"I feel terrible about what happened. I have to live with that all my life, that this poor girl died and she shouldn't be dead, she should be home with her family," Gregory said in the television interview.

Prosecutors allege Kolb and Gregory both strangled Reynolds, who had moved to Illinois from Texas about two months before she was killed. Kold and Gregory then took the body to Kolb's grandparents' farm in rural Mercer County and burned it, according to prosecutors, the AP reported.

Two days later, prosecutors say, the pair returned with a third teen, cut up the body and disposed of it in a creek on the farm and at a state park nearby.

A.M.