Jaclyn “Jackie” Leah Engman, a 25-year-old White woman, was killed inside her Newark, Delaware, apartment on January 26, 2017. Engman was a mother of two who had earned an associate degree in elementary education from the University of Phoenix and was pursuing a bachelor’s degree at Wilmington University. Her family remembered her as bright, humorous and devoted to her children, with interests that included singing, traveling, camping and spending time at the beach.
At approximately 6:30 that Thursday morning, New Castle County police were sent to the 700 block of Vinings Way in The Vinings apartment community after receiving a report of a suspicious death. Officers entered the residence and found Engman suffering from a fatal gunshot wound. Later accounts based on court documents stated that she was discovered in her bed with a gunshot wound to the head. Major Crimes Squad detectives took over the investigation and began searching both the apartment and another Newark residence connected to the man who soon became the case’s sole identified suspect.
That suspect was Jerry Blankenship, Engman’s former boyfriend and the father of one of her children. Blankenship went to New Castle County Police Headquarters on the morning of the killing and surrendered without incident. Court-related reporting later stated that he told officers he had killed Engman, prompting police to go to her apartment. Investigators searched the crime scene and Blankenship’s residence in the 600 block of South Harmony Road, where authorities said they recovered evidence implicating him in her death. No additional suspects were publicly identified in the case.
Police initially arrested Blankenship on charges of first-degree murder and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. Following his arraignment, he was committed to the Howard R. Young Correctional Institution after he was unable to post a cash-only bail set at $1,060,000. The arrest came one day after Engman’s death was discovered, turning what police had first described as a suspicious-death investigation into a murder prosecution.
In January 2018, Blankenship pleaded guilty to the reduced charge of second-degree murder and to possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. The Delaware Department of Justice reported that prosecutors secured the plea after Blankenship had admitted killing his former girlfriend in her Vinings Way apartment. By pleading guilty, he avoided a trial on the original first-degree murder charge but still faced the possibility of a life sentence.
On June 1, 2018, a Superior Court judge sentenced Blankenship to 35 years in prison for Engman’s killing and the related firearm offense. His surrender, confession, guilty plea and eventual sentence brought the criminal case to a close, with authorities identifying him as the only person responsible for the shooting. Engman’s death left her family grieving a young mother whose obituary emphasized the importance of her children and described them as her pride and joy.
