VIDEO: Terri-Lynne McClintic’s Confession

Victoria Stafford, age 8.

In May, 2009, police in Ontario charged Michael Rafferty, 28, with the abduction and murder of third-grader Tori Stafford. Also charged in the case was Rafferty’s girlfriend, 18-year-old Terri Lynne McClintic. At the time of their arrest, Stafford’s body had not yet been found. It would be July until investigators located the 8-year-old’s body, naked from the waist down, about 500 meters away from a rural road near Mount Forest, Ontario. An autopsy determined that she had been beaten to death with a claw hammer. She had 16 broken ribs.

Though McClintic was originally charged with being an accessory to murder, her charges were later upgraded to first-degree murder and unlawful confinement. She pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in prison. Rafferty went to trial and was found guilty of first-degree murder, kidnapping and sexual assault by a jury. He was also sentenced to life in prison.

In a taped confession shown to jurors at her trial, McClintic weeps and confesses, still clinging to the hope that if she rats out Rafferty, she’ll be OK.

WATCH: The Interrogation of Michael Rafferty