William Russell-Leonard was sentenced to roughly seven and a half years after pleading guilty in the stolen-car crash that killed Melanie Ross and Porsha Sapp at the Edmonds ferry terminal.
| Location | Edmonds ferry terminal, Edmonds, Washington |
|---|---|
| Defendant | William Russell-Leonard |
| Victims | Melanie Ross, 48, and Porsha Sapp, 45 |
| Incident | June 17, 2025 |
| Plea | Two vehicular-homicide counts, second-degree assault and possession of a stolen vehicle |
| Latest Event | Sentenced August 11, 2026 |
| Sentence | Approximately 7.5 years in prison |
What Happened
On June 17, 2025, William Russell-Leonard drove a stolen Mini Cooper during a police pursuit that ended when the car went through the Edmonds ferry-terminal area and plunged into the water. Three occupants, including Russell-Leonard, survived. Melanie Ross, 48, and Porsha Sapp, 45, were recovered from the water and died. Court reporting said the pursuit began after the vehicle was observed speeding on Interstate 5 and continued into Edmonds before the crash.
The People at the Center of the Case
Ross and Sapp were passengers in the vehicle and are the two people whose deaths form the core of the vehicular-homicide disposition. Russell-Leonard was 30 when he entered his plea in July 2026. The public record also described a surviving passenger and Russell-Leonard himself being rescued. This update keeps the focus on the named victims and the defendant without adding private information that is unnecessary to explain the criminal case.
Charges and Court Posture
Russell-Leonard originally faced murder and vehicular-homicide allegations. On July 15, 2026, in Snohomish County Superior Court, he pleaded guilty to two counts of vehicular homicide with disregard for the safety of others, second-degree assault and possession of a stolen vehicle. Judge Cindy Larsen accepted the plea. The plea eliminated the need for a trial on those resolved counts and moved the case to sentencing.
The Latest Verified Development
On August 11, 2026, the court imposed a prison term reported as roughly seven and a half years. That completed sentencing is later and more substantive than the July guilty-plea stage reflected in the earlier headline. Reporting also noted that Russell-Leonard was on community custody at the time of the crash, an aggravating part of the procedural background considered in the case.
Why the Update Changes the Earlier Headline
The earlier version captured an older procedural stage. The verified development described above changes what a reader needs to know now. this updated article therefore replaces the stale headline and chronology rather than simply appending a sentence to an outdated account. It distinguishes the underlying allegations from later pleas, rulings or sentences and does not treat a police theory as a court finding unless the later record supports that distinction.
Evidence and Investigative Record
The public record in this case contains evidence described by investigators, prosecutors, witnesses or court reporting. Those descriptions matter because they explain why authorities acted, but they are not interchangeable with proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Where reporting attributes surveillance, physical evidence, witness statements, digital records or forensic material to investigators, this article keeps that attribution. It does not infer missing facts or convert an allegation into an established fact merely because the allegation appears repeatedly.
What the Court Decision Does and Does Not Mean
The latest procedural event narrows the status of the case, but its legal meaning depends on the stage. A probable-cause ruling permits a prosecution to move forward without deciding guilt. A guilty plea or no-contest plea resolves specified charges but may leave sentencing issues. A sentence determines punishment on the resolved counts. A custody ruling concerns release rather than guilt. This article uses the precise stage supported by the reviewed sources and avoids implying a broader judicial finding than the record shows.
Date Used for Publication
The article date follows the publication-date standard of using the later of the underlying crime date or the most recent verified completed substantive case development. Future hearings, scheduled trials and expected filings do not count as completed outcomes. When an older archive does not expose the exact courtroom timestamp, the dated case report identifying the completed disposition is used and the limitation is stated rather than inventing a more precise date.
Current Status
This article now reflects the latest completed development located in the available case record. Later verified events can supersede it, including amended charges, grand-jury action, additional arrests, bond changes, pleas, verdicts, sentencing decisions, dismissals or appellate rulings. Until such a development is verified, the status described here is the current documented status for Crimes of the Week.
Editorial Standard
Crimes of the Week separates accusation, adjudication and punishment. Names and charges are used only when supported by case-specific reporting or official records, and victims are identified only when authorities or reliable reporting have made that information public. The article avoids unsupported motive claims, unnecessary personal details and generic legal filler. the purpose of this article is to preserve a case-specific chronology readers can understand without confusing an arrest, a charge, a court ruling and a conviction.
Sentencing Context
The sentencing coverage places the August 11 order in the context of the plea agreement and the standard ranges discussed when Russell-Leonard admitted the four felonies. The final sentence did not erase the seriousness of the two deaths or convert the case back into the original murder allegations. Instead, punishment followed the offenses to which he actually pleaded guilty. That distinction matters for the case record: the headline should not continue to say only that a plea occurred when the court has now imposed punishment. It also should not label Russell-Leonard a convicted murderer when the resolved convictions reported by the court coverage were vehicular homicide, assault and possession of a stolen vehicle. The updated wording therefore tracks both the final stage and the offenses actually adjudicated. That keeps the case record accurate after sentencing was completed.
Sources
- HeraldNet sentencing, Aug. 11, 2026
- KING 5 sentencing coverage
- KIRO 7 sentencing coverage, Aug. 12, 2026
- HeraldNet guilty plea, July 16, 2026
This case has reached sentencing. The article reports the plea and sentence from case-specific court coverage.
