Man pleads guilty to manslaughter in his mother’s killing in Corona del Mar in 1994

A 73-year-old Dana Point man pleaded guilty Wednesday to voluntary manslaughter in the 1994 beating death of his mother in Corona del Mar and was immediately sentenced to three years behind bars, or the time he had already served awaiting trial.

John Henry Van Uden III was given credit for 1,510 days behind bars with good behavior, meaning he could be released from custody.

Van Uden was charged two years ago with murder and faced a special-circumstance allegation of killing for financial gain. He pleaded not guilty in January 2018. Had he gone to trial and been convicted as charged, he could have faced life in prison without possibility of parole.

Van Uden’s 76-year-old mother, Frances Van Uden, was found dead in the living room of her home on Keel Drive in Corona del Mar on March 5, 1994. Anxious neighbors had called police because they hadn’t seen the widow in two days.

Police saw that the bedrooms had been ransacked. Jewelry, cash and credit cards were stolen, police said. The credit cards were never used.

Frances Van Uden’s body was slumped on a sofa with a large wound on the back of the head caused by being hit with a blunt object March 3, authorities said.

The family offered a $50,000 reward for the capture of her killer.

Over two decades, detectives continued to conduct interviews and collect evidence in the case. The investigation was reinvigorated when Newport Beach hired two part-time cold-case homicide investigators in 2016.

Investigators said they eventually linked John Van Uden to the homicide through DNA evidence from the envelope of a parking ticket he received while driving a rented Buick Regal. A neighbor told authorities that the car was at the house the night of the slaying.

Van Uden was having financial problems at the time of his mother’s death and had become angry when she removed him as the executor of her will, according to police.

Van Uden was arrested at Dana Point Harbor on Nov. 2, 2017.

“We have never forgotten what happened in March of 1994,” Newport Beach Police Chief Jon Lewis said after the arrest, saying Van Uden had been a “strong suspect” from the beginning.

Van Uden’s attorney, Mick Hill of the Orange County public defender’s office, filed a motion Nov. 7 arguing that his client could not receive a fair trial and had been denied his right to a speedy trial.

Hill, who did not join with his client in the plea Wednesday, claimed that Newport Beach police failed to investigate clues that could have exonerated his client and harassed his alibi witness and her son for years.

A neighbor told police after the killing that he suspected a roofing contractor may have killed the victim, Hill said.

An autopsy showed Frances Van Uden was killed by a lathe or roofing hammer, Hill said.

Daily Pilot staff contributed to this report.

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