Man in 2017 Cheney pot shop killing sentenced to prison after plea deal

A man who murdered a pot shop employee in Cheney in 2017 signed a plea deal last month and will serve 35 years to life in prison.

Donovan Culps, 37, confessed in October 2017 in front of a judge to murdering Cameron Smith. Smith worked at Lucid Marijuana in Cheney and refused to sell Culps marijuana in September 2017, which led Culp to allegedly kidnap him at gunpoint in his own car before shooting him in the head and dumping his remains in Airway Heights.

After being arrested, Culps also admitted to KHQ that he killed a man who he said murdered his child’s mother, Felina Metsker. Culps said he killed Neil Cloud, 20, and authorities found Cloud’s remains in Yakima County’s Medicine Valley in September 2017, the Yakima Herald-Republic reported. Federal prosecutors charged Culps, and another man, of murdering Cloud.

The FBI alleged George S. Cloud, 22, and Neil Cloud both shot Metsker in March 2016, according to an article in the Herald-Republic. A federal jury in Yakima last month found George S. Cloud guilty of murdering Metsker.

Culps spent a stint at Eastern State Hospital in December 2017 where doctors determined he did not have a mental illness, according to documents obtained by The Spokesman-Review.

Culps’ plea deal will require him to pay $2,342 in restitution, and after 416 months in prison he will serve 36 months of probation.

Culps also faced charges for first-degree kidnapping, robbery and unlawful possession of a firearm, but they were not included in the plea deal.