Officially, Kirk Levin was found guilty of first-degree murder and third-degree kidnapping in the same year. He is currently serving a life term at Iowa State Penitentiary.
This Friday, April 7, Dead Silent on ID will air a scary episode called “The Sinner and the Saint.” It goes back to the time when Jessica Vega was taken away. Kirk Levin, who was a friend of Vega’s on social media and had been linked to other crimes, tricked her into giving him money. The show will air the episode at 7 pm ET.
It says in the summary:
After helping a struggling teen she met on social media, Jessica Vega’s well-meaning attempts to get him on the right track quickly went wrong. Just 48 hours after he got out of jail, Kirk Levin was arrested and charged with many serious crimes, including murder and kidnapping. Marilyn Schmitt tells what happened and how sad it was.
Kirk Levin, who lived in Early, Iowa, was charged with killing his 45-year-old mother Marilyn Schmitt on January 3, 2013. The event happened not long after he got out of jail on January 1 after serving 26 months of his 5-year sentence for third-degree burglary. In a different case, he was also said to have taken Jessica Vega from her home in Storm Lake.
On January 3, Jessica Vega called the police to say that Levin had attacked her and taken her from her flat. In the morning of that day, Levin had asked for a ride. Levin was found hiding in a nearby barn, even though she was able to run away and get help from a stranger. He was accused of theft, assaulting someone, and other similar things.
Kirk Levin’s life got a new start on January 1, 2013, when he was let out of jail after serving time there. But instead of using this chance to change his life for the better, he turned to crime. In a terrifying chain of events, he killed his 45-year-old mother and then tricked an online friend into leaving her flat so he could take her.
After he got out of jail, it only took Levin two days to hurt his mother very badly by cutting her many times in her own home. Then he ran away to Storm Lake, Iowa, to see his MySpace friend Jessica Vega, but he lied to get her out of her flat. He forced her to drive him somewhere else, and when they got there, he took her. After the car they were in crashed into a ditch, Vega was able to escape from her kidnapper. Someone who wanted to help stepped in, which gave Vega a chance to get away.