A California man guilty of throwing his dead wife’s dismembered legs in a garbage before opening credit cards in her name and lavishly spending on a boat and a Hummer SUV for his new lover, whom he met at a strip club, has been sentenced.
San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan said on Friday, May 2, that Jack Potter, 72, was sentenced to 15 years to life in state prison for the murder of his wife, Laurie Diane Potter, 54, in 2003.
“This was a brutal, calculated murder that shattered the lives of Laurie’s loved ones, who then had to endure nearly 20 years of unanswered questions and unimaginable grief,” the district attorney said.
Law authorities became aware of the heinous crime on October 5, 2003, when a maintenance worker at the Country Hills Apartment complex in Rancho San Diego discovered a pair of severed human legs in a dumpster, as previously reported by PEOPLE.
The Medical Examiner’s Office and the San Diego Sheriff’s Office Homicide Unit “exhausted all traditional avenues of identifying the woman without success,” according to a release issued in 2021.
The case remained cold until 2020, when the San Diego County Sheriff’s Homicide Cold Case Team attempted to identify the victim for the first time using investigative genetic genealogy, according to Stephan.
The Cold Case Team identified the woman’s adult son using DNA from her legs, according to a sheriff’s office release. The victim was positively identified as Laurie Diane Potter using DNA, and the Cold Case Team launched an extensive investigation into Laurie’s life, according to the sheriff’s office.
According to the sheriff’s office, investigators discovered that Laurie lived in Temecula in 2003, was married to Jack Dennis Potter, and had never been reported missing. “The investigation revealed substantial and convincing evidence that Jack murdered Laurie,” according to the statement.
Potter was arrested in 2021 in connection to his wife’s death. In February 2025, a month before his trial, he pled guilty to second-degree murder and admitted to choking his wife to death.
Details of Potter’s opulent lifestyle after his wife’s legs were discovered were revealed during grand jury proceedings in August 2024.
Jurors heard how Potter “became obsessed in 2003 with a woman he met at a strip club—who shared the same first name as his wife,” Stephan explained.
Within weeks of discovering Laurie’s legs, Potter created various credit accounts and “made extravagant purchases, including a new pick-up truck, a Hummer SUV, and a ski boat,” according to Stephan.
He handed the Hummer and boat to his new girlfriend, rented her an apartment in Corona Hills, and gave her a credit card with a $30,000 maximum.
Potter proceeded to issue credit cards in Laurie’s name and file bogus Family Court filings claiming to have contacted his wife about the proceedings years after she was slain, according to Stephan.
He proceeded to Family Court in Temecula to sell the family home “and pocket all profits,” Stephan alleged.
“This case is a stark reminder that the pursuit of justice never stops,” prosecutors said. “Nor does the pain of those who have lost someone to violence. Today, we celebrate Laurie’s memory and support her family during this long-awaited moment of justice.”
