Killer gets 40 years

One of the more bizarre murder cases in Butte County history reached final resolution Tuesday (Dec. 16), when Judge Gerald Hermanson sentenced Clinton Ray Egbert, 46, to 40 years to life in prison for killing his wife, Tami Egbert, nearly nine years ago.

After Tami Egbert disappeared on Feb. 11, 2000, her body was found beaten and shot below Lookout Point. Police had long suspected Egbert had killed her in their Manzanita Avenue home but lacked sufficient evidence to arrest him until 2007.

Things had changed by then: Egbert had made incriminating statements to witnesses, for one, and investigators also had found a second bullet hole in Tami Egbert’s sweater, corroborating witnesses’ testimony that they had heard what sounded like two shots the night she was killed.