Sentencing Dates Set for Will Forgers

Donna Herring admitted to creating a will after Matthew Seth Jacobs, who had survived the Deepwater Horizon disaster in April 2010, died in a one-vehicle wreck in January 2015.

Donna Herring, the former Camden real estate agent who orchestrated the infamous fake will case, finally has a court date.

Her sentencing hearing is set for Nov. 12 at 9:30 a.m. in U.S. District Court in El Dorado in front of Chief U.S. District Court Judge Susan O. Hickey.

Sentencing dates were also set for the others who pleaded guilty in connection with their roles in the fake will: Herring’s daughter, Jordan Alexandra Peterson, who pleaded guilty in January 2018, and Herring’s sister and brother-in-law, Marion “Diane” Kinley and John Wayne Kinley Jr., who pleaded guilty in April 2018.

John Wayne Kinley will be sentenced on the afternoon of Nov. 12, and the other two defendants will be sentenced on Nov. 13.

Herring pleaded guilty in 2018 to a federal charge in connection with a scheme to create a fake will for Matthew Seth Jacobs. In a court filing, she said she loved him like a son.

Jacobs survived the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion in 2010 and had received sizable settlements before he died at 34 in a one-car accident in January 2015.

Herring created a fake will so that the bulk of Jacobs’ estate would go to her daughter, Peterson, instead of Jacobs’ only child, Jordan Jacobs.

A restitution hearing for all defendants is set for Nov. 14. Jordan Jacobs said in court papers that he’s entitled to $735,427 in restitution.

Last month, Hickey had set the sentencing dates for Sept. 18 and 19, but the defendants asked for a continuance partly because of scheduling conflicts with the defense attorneys.

Hickey agreed to make the change, but it looks like it will be the last one. In her court order filed earlier this month, she wrote, “the sentencing and restitution hearings will not be further continued or modified.”

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