GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — The man who was convicted of killing a Kent County woman in 1996 died from natural causes on Thursday while incarcerated with the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC), a spokesperson for the MDOC confirmed.
On Sept. 28, Gary Artman was convicted of murdering and sexually assaulting Sharon Hammack. The case had gone cold until DNA from a murder in Maryland linked Artman to the Hammack murder.
A Kent County Judge sentenced Garry Dean Artman to life without parole for the murder of 29-year-old Hammack, and a consecutive life sentence for rape.
During closing arguments in the murder trial, Kent County Senior Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Blair Lachman told the jury when you strangle someone, it takes two to three minutes for that to occur.
Then, he waited in silence for about 2 minutes as a timer ticking down projected onto a screen juxtaposed with Hammack's autopsy photo.
"Two to three minutes is a lifetime. To think. To contemplate. To stop and spare that life. There is no question about what Mr. Artman was thinking," Attorney Lachman said to the jury.
"His intent was to kill."
Artman's defense attorney Criminal Defense Attorney John Pyrski said in his closing remarks Artman was a customer of Hammack's and that explains why his DNA was found on her body.
Hammack's family wept in the courtroom.
"Relief. Justice was served," Hammack's sister said. "I will never forgive him. She was beautiful. She didn't deserve that."
The prosecution team said while they're relieved with the conviction, they still feel a bit of unfinished business.
"The evidence was overwhelming," Lachman said. "Relief. But still feel a little bit unfinished, because I feel there's more out there that he's not telling us."
In Kent County in 1996, 11 murders happened in a short period of time. They remain unsolved.
Earlier this year, 64-year-old Artman was arrested in Mississippi. Advancements in forensic genetic genealogy helped investigators track down and connect Artman to her murder.
Artman was also recently charged to the 2006 murder in Maryland, and he was set to face trial there.
On Oct. 3, 1996, Kent County Sheriff deputies responded to an incident on 76th Street SE, between Patterson Ave and Kraft Ave in Caledonia Township.
That's when they found a deceased woman and determined she had been sexually assaulted and strangled to death. That woman was later identified as Hammack.
She was found lying in tall grass in a field, wrapped in some type of cloth. Authorities in 1996 said her panties were pulled down around her ankles, and her body was just 10 feet off the road.
She was also four weeks pregnant.
According to a probable cause affidavit from the Kent County 63rd District Court, Artman has an extensive history of Criminal Sexual Assault (CSC) crimes, and spent 11 years in the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) for a charge of CSC 1st Degree. He was sent to prison in August of 1981, and then discharged on the maximum (meaning the MDOC had the ability, but chose not to parole him), in June of 1992, just four years before Hammack was murdered.
MDOC told 13 ON YOUR SIDE that Artman died of natural causes while incarcerated.
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