Staff file photo / Ed Runyan James Jarrell, 41, in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court with his attorney, Aaron Meikle, during a hearing in his case in July. Jarrell pleaded guilty Wednesday to voluntary manslaughter in the killing of his stepmother, Tina Jarrell at her West Side home.

YOUNGSTOWN — James Jarrell, 41, who was granted a new trial by the 7th District Court of Appeals in his murder case, instead took a plea Wednesday on a lower-level charge of voluntary manslaughter.

Judge Anthony Donofrio of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court sentenced Jarrell, 41, formerly of Austintown, to 20 years in prison. In addition to voluntary manslaughter, Jarrell pleaded guilty to kidnapping, receiving stolen property and tampering with evidence. His trial was set to take place Oct. 30.

Jarrell was sentenced to 19 years to life in prison in 2018 after being convicted at trial of murder, tampering with evidence and receiving stolen property in the July 7, 2015, death of his stepmother, Tina Jarrell, 55. A jury found James Jarrell not guilty of other offenses, so those charges were no longer are part of the case.

But the court of appeals overturned the convictions about two years ago, saying Judge Lou D’Apolito, who oversaw the first trial, should have allowed James Jarrell to present evidence that his stepmother allegedly sexually assaulted James when he was a juvenile. Tina Jarrell was stabbed to death at her West Side Youngstown home.

According to the appeals court ruling, Jarrell admitted to killing his stepmother after the two argued. Trial testimony indicated James Jarrell and his stepmother engaged in sexual touching on the day they met when he was 8 years old. Several years later, when James was 15, his father started dating Tina Jarrell and they married soon after.

When James Jarrell moved into the house of his father and stepmother at age 15 or 16, the touching escalated to sexual intercourse between James and his stepmother, and they regularly used drugs together, according to James Jarrell’s testimony.

He also testified that on the day of the killing, his stepmother told him she was going to divorce James’ father and asked James Jarrell to move to Florida with her. That led to his stepmother becoming physically and verbally abusive and her throwing objects at him, he testified. That led to James cutting her with box cutter, he testified, according to The Vindicator archives.

After the confrontation, James Jarrell took two credit cards and fled to Pittsburgh in his stepmother’s car. He was arrested in Pittsburgh, the appeals ruling states.

His attorney during the trial obtained a psychological evaluation, and it showed that James Jarrell suffered from post traumatic stress disorder as a result of childhood sexual abuse involving his stepmother, but D’Apolito did not allow the testimony at trial.

James Jarrell has been in the Mahoning County jail awaiting his retrial since July 6, 2021, according to jail records.

erunyan@vindy.com