Kevin Baker - Repeat sex offender pleads guilty to murder

A registered sex offender pleaded guilty Monday to suffocating an escort service worker he called to his apartment.

Kevin Baker, 39, faces 20 years in prison when he is sentenced in March for killing 24-year-old Jillian Flagg last October.

The Amherst woman was found bound and suffocated in Baker's second-floor Buffalo apartment after her screams led to a 911 call. When police knocked on Baker's door, he jumped out of a window. He was arrested a short time later in a nearby yard.

Prosecutors said Flagg was fully clothed and there was no evidence of a sexual assault. At the time of his arrest, Baker told police he was under the influence of cocaine.

Baker, who initially was charged with second-degree murder and attempted sex abuse, pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in state Supreme Court.

Baker served a brief jail term in 2006 for a 2005 incident with an 11-year-old girl. Authorities said Baker was drunk when he dragged the girl off a couch and straddled her. He pleaded guilty to misdemeanor unlawful imprisonment and was sentenced to one year in jail. As a result, he was listed as a Level 2 sex offender on the state Sex Offender Registry.