Georgia man sentenced to 10 years for concealing body of teacher Tara Grinstead

A Georgia man convicted of helping to burn and hide the body of teacher and beauty queen Tara Grinstead was slapped with the maximum sentence Monday.

Ryan Duke has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for concealing the body and is already eligible for parole after serving more than five years while awaiting trial, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

Duke, who had confessed to the 2005 murder of the 30-year-old woman, was found not guilty of malice murder, felony murder, aggravated assault and burglary Friday after changing his story on the stand.

Ryan Duke (Hyosub Shin/)

Grinstead never showed up for work at Irwin County High School in October 2005 and was never heard from again, despite nationwide headlines. In 2017, a tipster pointed the Georgia Bureau of Investigation toward her then-boyfriend, Bo Dukes, who then pointed to Duke, his former friend and roommate.

Georgia man acquitted of 2005 murder of high school teacher after confessing

A day later, Duke confessed to killing Grinstead after breaking into her house, looking for money to buy drugs, and led police to a pecan grove owned by Dukes’ family, where he said the pair had burned her body and buried it.

Duke was arrested on Feb. 22, 2017, and charged with Grinstead’s murder. Dukes, the tipster’s boyfriend, was later sentenced to 25 years in prison for helping to conceal the body.

The Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2006, file photo of missing teacher Tara Grinstead is prominently displayed on a billboard in Ocilla, Ga. (Elliott Minor/)

But during his trial, Duke said he only confessed because he was scared of Dukes, who he claimed was the one to actually kill Grinstead.

Dukes was called to testify, but invoked his Fifth Amendment rights.

Judge Bill Reinhardt credited Duke for seeming remorseful for his actions, but ignored his lawyer’s requests for a sentence of time served.

“You don’t know really what pain your actions cause until somebody reminds you that every day what they live with is, ‘They can’t find Tara,’” Reinhard said at the hearing, according to the Journal Constitution.

“Every day, they couldn’t find Tara. And it is true that despite whatever your selfish feelings were for not coming forward, you had to the power to stop that pain for years.”