FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – Deputies are holding a 54-year-old man without bond after prosecutors accused him of killing a 33-year-old mother and abandoning her body in a canal in Davie — while he was on a conditional release for killing a teenage girl.
Records show Eric Pierson, who is 6-foot-8-inches tall, has been in and out of prison since he was 16. Carmen Verdecia said Monday she wants to know why the Florida Department of Corrections freed Pierson, the convicted felon who confessed to killing her daughter.
Police divers found Erika Verdecia dead on Saturday in a canal in Davie. Pierson confessed to stabbing her twice in the neck and once in each eye with a screwdriver, according to the Sunrise Police Department. Officers arrested him on Sunday and he appeared in front of Broward Judge Tabitha Blackmon on Monday.
Records show the Florida Department of Corrections released Pierson on Sept. 3, 2020. He had served about 25 years out of his 40-year sentence for the murder of 17-year-old Kristina Whitaker, of Hollywood. According to the Florida Commission on Offender Review, Pierson was “actively serving on conditional release supervision” and that supervision was scheduled to terminate on Jan. 14, 2034.
Officers accused Pierson of beating and strangling Whitaker in 1993 after detectives found her body on Jan. 22, 1994, at a construction site in Davie, police said. Prosecutors had charged him with first-degree murder, but Pierson pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced on Dec. 1, 1995.
When Pierson was convicted of killing Whitaker, he had served four years out of his 18-year sentence for using a kitchen knife to slide a woman’s throat after breaking into her home in Davie. Officers reported the woman survived the attack.
Like Carmen Verdecia, Whitaker’s mother, Roxann Grimstead, was also outraged when she learned authorities had allowed Pierson to be released early.
On Monday, Pierson was at the Broward County main jail for violating the terms of his conditional release in Whitaker’s case. He is facing a first-degree murder charge in Verdecia’s case. Judge Blackmon denied his bond.