Elizabeth Roxanne Haysom is a Canadian citizen who, along with her then boyfriend, Jens Söring, was convicted of orchestrating the 1985 double murder of her parents Derek and Nancy Haysom in Bedford County, Virginia. Following the Haysoms' murders, Haysom and Söring were arrested in London, England, for check fraud and shoplifting. Haysom was serving a 90-year prison sentence at the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women in Troy, Virginia after pleading guilty to two counts of accessory to murder before the fact in 1987. She and Jens Soering were paroled from jail on November 25, 2019 - more than 30 years after they were first convicted in the gruesome slayings of Haysom’s parents in 1985. Elizabeth Haysom was the child of Derek William Reginald Haysom, a retired steel executive, and Nancy Astor Benedict Haysom, an artist. Derek and Nancy had a combined total of five children from previous marriages. Born in April 1964, Elizabeth attended boarding schools in Switzerland and England, then enrolled at the University of Virginia. It was there she met her 18-year-old boyfriend Jens Söring, the son of a German diplomat and a Jefferson Scholar at the university. After more than 30 years in prison in Virginia, Elizabeth Haysom was released from prison to ICE on parole in November of 2019. She was deported to her home country of Canada.
Murders
On the morning of April 3rd, 1985, when Söring was 18 and Haysom was 20, the bodies of Derek and Nancy Haysom were discovered. They had been slashed and stabbed to death in their home in the then unincorporated hamlet of Boonsboro in Bedford County, Virginia. Both Derek and Nancy were almost decapitated. The couple's bodies were not discovered until days after the murder. During the timeline of the murder, Elizabeth Haysom had rented a car. She and Jens drove to Washington, D.C. to establish an alibi.
Flight to England
Elizabeth Haysom and Jens Söring were not initially suspects in the Haysoms' murders. Six months after the murder, Söring and Haysom went to England, where they were arrested on 30 April 1986 for writing over $5,000 in fake cashier checks and then using false documentation and lying to the police in London.
Convictions
In 1987, instead of going to trial, then 23-year-old Haysom pleaded guilty to two counts of accessory to murderbefore the fact, and was sentenced to 90 years in prison - one 45-year sentence for each murder, to be served consecutively. Söring was sentenced, in 1990, to two consecutive life terms for first-degree murder. Elizabeth Haysom first became eligible for parole in 1995, resubmitting a parole request every three years thereafter. On 25 November 2019, Governor Ralph Northam announced that both Haysom and Söring would be released, but not pardoned, and sent back to their respective home countries. She was incarcerated at the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women in Troy, Virginia before being paroled. Under mandatory parole, Haysom was required to be released no later than 2032, 45 years after her conviction.
The Söring/Haysom criminal proceedings were the first to be broadcast nationwide on American television. The Haysoms' murders have been profiled by 20/20, The Investigators, Geraldo Rivera, The New Detectives, City Confidential, Wicked Attraction, Deadly Women, On the Case with Paula Zahn, , and Southern Fried Homicide. Killing for Love, a feature documentary film, premiered at the Munich International Film Festival and was released theatrically in October 2016.
Granted parole
Haysom was sentenced to 90 years in jail, but was released on parole in November of 2019. The report of her parole has caused the frustration of many law officials since her parole was granted based on financial benefits for the state of Virginia, rather than good merit. The chair of the Virginia Parole Board, Adrianne L. Bennett, added that the decision to grant Haysom parole was also justified by her young age at the time the crime was committed.She was released into the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, since she is a Canadian citizen. Haysom remains in a ICE facility in Georgia, even though there is a mandate for her deportation from 1989. Jens Soering, Haysom's accomplice was granted parole as well, but was deported to his home country of Germany promptly after his release.
