No verdict or sentencing would be harsh enough for the people who killed Kansas University student Shannon Martin, her mother said Tuesday in Costa Rica.

But Jeanette Stauffer, of Topeka, also said she was willing to accept the three-judge panel’s verdict, which came Monday after a trial that stretched more than two weeks.

“I am very satisfied with the Costa Rican judicial system,” Stauffer said. “The judges analyzed the evidence very well. But as a mother, there is no sentence that would be enough to punish the brutal murder of my daughter. Nothing will bring her back to me.”

The judges ruled that Kattia Cruz, 29, and Luis Alberto Castro Carrillo, 33, were guilty of “simple homicide” in the May 2001 stabbing death of Martin. The co-defendants each were sentenced to 15 years in prison.

A third suspect, Rafael Zumbado Quesada, 52, was found not guilty.

Martin, 23, was found stabbed to death May 13, 2001. Her body was discovered in the early-morning hours along a dark airstrip-access road in Golfito, 105 miles south of the Costa Rican capital of San Jose. She had been walking home from a disco.

Martin had been in Costa Rica working on a biology project and was to graduate from KU about a week later.

Friends’ emotions mixed

The Rev. Thad Holcombe of Lawrence said he didn’t get much sleep Monday night after learning two people had been convicted and would serve 15 years for Martin’s murder.

Jeanette Stauffer speaks with the press after the murder trial of the three defendants accused of murdering her daughter, Shannon Martin, in 2001 in Golfito, Costa Rica. On Tuesday, Costa Ricans Kattia Cruz, 29, and Luis Alberto Castro Carrillo, 33, were found guilty of murder and sentenced to 15 years in prison for the killing of Martin, a 23-year-old Kansas University student from Topeka.

Like others who knew Martin or were familiar with the case, Holcombe said he wrestled with mixed emotions.

“There’s no penalty that will bring justice totally; there’s no verdict that’s going to bring total closure,” said Holcombe, minister at Ecumenical Christian Ministries, where Martin was a familiar face while she was a KU student.

“I kind of don’t know what to say,” said Kyle Maude, a high school friend of Martin’s now living in New York City. “It’s been an emotional roller coaster.”

Maude said she was disappointed that the two Costa Ricans who were convicted wouldn’t spend more time behind bars, though she was pleased a modicum of justice was served.

“I guess I was always thinking nothing was going to come of this, so it is a good thing in a sense that a trial occurred,” Maude said.

Mother’s resolve

Martin’s mother deserves much of the credit for seeing that the investigation was carried through and that the case went to trial, said Larry Welch, director of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation.

“It was her pushing, and it took a lot of pushing in different directions for Jeanette to accomplish what she accomplished,” Welch said.

Welch sent a KBI agent to Cost Rica with Stauffer after the initial investigation went nowhere. The agent, Larry Thomas, assisted Costa Rican authorities when the probe was revived.

Welch said he was not surprised at the outcome of the trial based on his knowledge of the evidence and Costa Rican law.

The case was difficult, especially because the initial investigation wasn’t handled as aggressively or as thoroughly as it would have been in Kansas, Welch said.

“Given the late start, given the way the investigation went at the outset, this, perhaps, is better than nothing,” Welch said.

Pedro Irigonegary, a Topeka attorney who also traveled to Costa Rica with Stauffer to provide assistance, declined to judge the trial’s outcome without talking with Stauffer first.

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“Suffice it to say this has been a very, very difficult process for Jeanette and her entire family,” Irigonegary said. “This senseless and brutal killing is one that has created immense anguish, not only for her family but also for the good people of Golfito.”

KU officials also kept track of events in Costa Rica. Jeff Weinberg, assistant to Chancellor Robert Hemenway, traveled to the country with Stauffer. Weinberg also said it was too early to judge the trial’s outcome without knowing more details about what took place. He said he had not talked with Stauffer.

“I think one issue is very clear,” Weinberg said. “No one — no one — could have done more than Jeanette Stauffer in order to amass as much evidence as possible.”

Hemenway, in a statement, commended Stauffer’s “tireless efforts” in pursuing justice for her daughter’s killers.

“No verdict can atone for her death, but she will never be forgotten by the university, her friends or her family,” Hemenway’s statement said.

— The Associated Press contributed to this report.