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Wife of KKK leader Frank Ancona pleads guilty to killing him

Malissa Ancona, who initially claimed her son fired the shots that killed Frank Ancona, changed her story in court on Friday.

ST. FRANCOIS COUNTY, Mo. — The wife of self-identified Ku Klux Klan leader Frank Ancona admitted to shooting and killing him in 2017.

Malissa Ancona pled guilty to second-degree murder in St. Francois County Court on Friday. She was sentenced to life in prison, plus four years for tampering. The sentences will run concurrently.

Frank Ancona, 51, was a self-identified "imperial wizard" of a group called the Traditional American Knights of the Ku Klux Klan.

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Malissa Ancona first reported him missing in February of 2017. Several days later, a family that was fishing found his body on the bank of the Big River in Belgrade, Missouri.

Malissa Ancona and her then 24-year-old son Paul E. Jinkerson, Frank Ancona's stepson, were taken into police custody in St. Francois County shortly after. That's when Malissa Ancona told police that her son shot her husband while he was sleeping.

But in court on Friday, Ancona admitted to firing both shots that killed her husband, saying that Jinkerson helped clean up the crime scene and dump the body.

Court documents said that Frank Ancona had recently asked for a divorce before he was killed.

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