Molly Corbett, wife of Irish businessman Jason Corbett and her father Thomas Martens are re-sentenced to four years in prison for the 2015 murder of her husband

A former model and her father, an ex-FBI agent, have been sentenced to prison again for the murder of her Irish businessman husband, who was beaten to death in 2015.

Father-of-two Jason Corbett, 39, was beaten to death with an aluminum baseball bat and stone paver by his wife Molly Corbett and her father Thomas Martens at the couple’s home in Davidson County, North Carolina.

Corbett and her father were convicted of the murder in 2017, but the North Carolina Supreme Court reversed their second-degree murder conviction in 2021 and ordered a new trial. Both were sentenced in 2017 to 20 to 25 years.

Last month, the father and daughter entered plea deals to voluntary manslaughter: Corbett pleaded no contest and Martens pleaded guilty to the charge.

Defense attorneys said the two acted in self-defense after Corbett strangled Molly and that they feared for their lives during a fight with the husband.

They were sentenced Wednesday to a minimum of four years and a maximum of six years – and were given credit for the three years and eight months they had already served. The pair were also instructed not to contact Corbett’s family.

Their convictions were overturned after the Supreme Court pointed to omitted statements made by the Corbetts’ two children during a medical evaluation shortly after the death, which showed their father had been abusive at home.

Jurors also reportedly admitted to acting inappropriately during the trial.

Prosecutors alleged that the children’s statements were not reliable and that both later recanted. The judge excluded the statements from participating in the trial.

Born in Ireland, Jason Corbett met Molly Corbett in 2008 when she was working as an au pair for two children from his first marriage. His first wife died of an asthma attack in 2006.

The two quickly became romantically involved and moved their family to Davidson County, North Carolina in 2011.

Over time, she claimed that Corbett became more controlling and physically and verbally abusive – a claim his two children repeated when questioned by social workers.

Martens, who lived in Tennessee and worked for the FBI for more than 30 years, was visiting the family at the time of the murder. He testified at their 2017 trial that he was woken up at night in the Corbetts’ home by noises and screams.

He said he found the couple in their bedroom, and Jason said with his hands around Molly’s neck, “I’m going to kill her.”

Prosecutors said a possible motive for the gruesome slaughter may have been that Martens Corbett adopted the children and took out a $600,000 life insurance policy.

Corbett’s children Jack and Sarah, who live with their father’s family in Ireland, have since retracted some of their previous statements suggesting he had been abusive.

The children’s statements showed that Jason became increasingly angry on the night of his death, when his then seven-year-old daughter could not fall asleep.

Last week, prosecutors played two videos in which Corbett’s children Jack and Sarah said their father was abusive shortly after his funeral. A year later they shared their testimony.

In the videos, Sarah can be seen saying her father would get mad at Corbett for “ridiculous reasons” such as leaving the lights on, and that he would yell at her every day. The girl also claimed that she witnessed her father being physically abusive, deliberately stepping on his wife and running over her with his car.

Sarah’s brother Jack made similar statements, saying the couple did not get along and that their stepmother said she was afraid of his father. At the time, the children said they wanted to stay in the US with their stepmother.

In ruling to overturn the convictions, Associate Justice Anita Earls wrote that Supreme Court Justice David Lee had erred primarily in excluding the children’s statements to social workers.

Earls pointed to omitted statements made by the Corbetts’ two children during a medical evaluation shortly after the death, which showed their father had been abusive at home. Lee ruled the statements were not reliable, pointing out that the children had retracted some previous allegations in a later interview with prosecutors and in diary entries.

Without the evidence, “it was easier for the jury to conclude that Tom and Molly fabricated their story in an attempt to cover up their crime and falsely claim that they acted in self-defense,” Earls wrote.

In addition, jurors reportedly admitted that they had spoken about the case against the judge’s instructions.

They claimed that they “formed an opinion about Molly Corbett despite the fact that she did not even take the witness stand” and “developed their own theories” that were “not supported by the facts or evidence.”

After Corbett and Martins’ convictions were overturned, Tracey Corbett Lynch and David Lynch, the legal guardians of Jason Corbett’s children, Jack and Sarah, released a lengthy and detailed statement, accusing the district attorney of targeting the defendants’ to get away with murder’.

“What does it say about justice in North Carolina that you can drug a father of two, then beat him to death with a baseball bat and a paving stone, literally crush his skull and still escape a murder conviction?” the relatives wrote. “What does it say about justice that you can escape a murder conviction as long as you have deep pockets and deep connections?”