A Lubec man was sentenced Tuesday to 32 years in prison for the murder of his girlfriend in her home in January 2022.
Paul DeForest, 67, also was given a 5-year concurrent sentence for trying to get a jail inmate to burn down a house owned by a potential witness. DeForest would be 99 years old if he lives long enough to complete the sentence and be released.
DeForest did not address Justice Robert Murray at his sentencing, which was held in Machias. Friends and relatives of Eva Cox, who DeForest shot and killed, also were in the courtroom but declined to address the court or to speak with reporters after the hearing.
DeForest shot and killed Cox, who was 58, while a friend of DeForest’s was staying at Cox’s home on Jim’s Head Road, according to police.
The friend reported the shooting to police two days later. He told police he had dozed off in a bedroom after eating dinner with DeForest and Cox but was awakened by a loud “pop.” He went downstairs, saw Cox lying on the floor and “heard her gurgling and saw blood around her body” as he got closer, court documents say.
He also saw a pistol on a counter near DeForest, who told the friend to leave and then dragged Cox by her arm through a set of French doors onto an outside patio, according to documents.
Cox’s body was found January 11, 2022 in the trunk of her car, which was parked on a neighbor’s property.
DeForest was arrested January 12, 2022, at a house in Virginia, after he called the friend to say he was “headed to West Virginia to get his dog to his daughter before he got caught,” according to court documents.
