Inset left: Jamie Busch (YouTube/WROC). Inset right: Penny Busch (Facebook). Background: The home in Monroe County, N.Y., where Busch was killed (WHEC/YouTube).
An upstate New York woman convicted of murdering her own sister who was apparently threatening to evict her says that she's innocent — and that the victim's daughter is the one who did the crime.
Jamie Busch was sentenced Thursday to 25 years to life in prison for the murder of 62-year-old Penny Busch in October 2024. As Law&Crime previously reported, Jamie Busch was accused of strangling her sister, Penny Busch, at their home in Honeoye Falls, a village around 18 miles south of Rochester, New York. She then dumped the victim's body in the Genesee River and tossed three of her sister's cellphones into a trash bin behind a Dunkin' Donuts.
The defendant, who was 53 years old when she strangled her sister, was also accused of tampering with evidence. She was convicted in February.
"I just want to say this is not the first time that she has tried to strangle a family member," cousin Mary Shadders told local ABC affiliate WHAM at the time. "We're glad that even though the jury couldn't hear the whole story of her history that they were able to make the right decision."
At the sentencing, Judge Stephen Miller said Jamie Busch was "not remorseful in any way, shape or form," according to WHAM. In a long prepared statement, Jamie Busch reportedly said she was "framed" and that her sister's killer is "still out there." She pointed the finger at the victim's daughter, who prosecutors determined was in a different state — South Carolina — at the time.
On Oct. 8, 2024, the sisters were at Penny Busch's home on Ontario Street, outside of the small village of Honeoye Falls, New York. Sometime after 4:49 p.m., the women got in a "physical altercation," and Jamie Busch strangled her sister to death, according to a criminal complaint obtained by local NBC affiliate WHEC.
Early the following day, the suspect took three of her sister's cellphones and discarded them in a trash bin at the village's Dunkin' Donuts, the court document continues. At some point in the ensuing days, Jamie Busch reportedly transported Penny Busch's body from her home and threw it in the Genesee River.
The Monroe County Sheriff's Office was asked to do a welfare check on Penny Busch's home, and on Oct. 11, 2024, deputies responded to her eight-acre residence. As they investigated, they "believed her disappearance was suspicious," and a search, complete with K-9s, drones, and more, commenced.
Three days later, investigators "developed information focusing the search to an area of the Genesee River in the Town of Rush," the sheriff's office said.
A body was found, and it was later identified as Penny Busch.
Conrad Hoyt contributed to this report.