Matthew Sidney Watley

By Zak Failla From Daily Voice

A New Jersey truck driver with a history of domestic violence will spend decades in prison after his partner was found stabbed to death in a tractor-trailer at a Costco Depot in Maryland, authorities announced.

Matthew Sidney Watley, of Sicklerville, New Jersey, was sentenced to 40 years in prison after pleading guilty last month to the murder of his partner, Candice Thompson, in September 2023.

Officials say that a strange, ultimately deadly scene played out at the Costco Distribution Center on Intercoastal Drive in New Market shortly after 1:30 a.m. on Sunday, Sept. 24, 2023, where there were calls of a drunk driver who smashed out the window of his own truck and was destroying its interior.

Costco Distribution Center on Intercostal Drive in Monrovia

Google Maps street view

Upon arrival at Costco, deputies from the Frederick County Sheriff's Office found Watley in the front seat of his truck with the engine running in the parking lot. Watley was argumentative and refused to speak with authorities, despite suffering an injury while breaking the windshield, police said.

Security at the facility told deputies that the trailer had been disengaged abruptly from its cab and had been dragged for several feet prior to his outburst. 

When deputies made contact with Watley, who was operating the vehicle, they noted that he was speaking incoherently and refusing their commands to shut off the vehicle’s engine.  

It was determined that he was under the influence, and as a precaution, spike strips were placed in the front and back of the tractor-trailer, though the driver was undeterred, and drove through them in the secure area of the Costco lot, prompting a very slow-speed police pursuit.

Wheel chocks were eventually thrown under all wheels after Watley made several additional starts and stops with the truck, though deputies were then able to deflate the tires, and he was stuck.

Investigators say that Watley eventually stopped in the exit lane of the distribution center, and continued to refuse commands to get out of the truck.

According to a spokesperson from the sheriff's office, the driver remained confrontational, forcing deputies to use pepper spray through his open window, though he stayed steadfast and steady behind the wheel, at which point they broke a different window, got into the cab, and were able to detain him after deploying a Taser-like device.

Watley had what appeared to be blood on his shirt, hands, and face, prosecutors said.

Then they made a ghastly discovery.

While searching the truck's cab, they found the 46-year-old Thompson, also from Sicklerville, lying face down on the floor of the cab with multiple stab wounds to her back.

Responding paramedics pronounced her dead at around 3 a.m. on the morning of the incident.

Thompson's body was taken to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Baltimore, where it was determined that her cause of death was blunt and sharp force trauma.

While he was detained, Watley was taken to Frederick Health Hospital for medical and mental health evaluations and treatment.

Detectives later learned that Thompson and Watley were "in a dating relationship and had a history of domestic violence in New Jersey with the Winslow Township Police Department."

The victim’s mother addressed the court in her Victim Impact Statement.

“I don’t want to live after what this monster did to my daughter," she said. "He destroyed my family.”

State's Attorney Charlie Smith called the incident "a tragic loss of life." 

"My heart goes out to the family. Domestic violence homicides are becoming an epidemic in our country," he said. "These violent offenders need to be treated harshly at the outset before they go on to take the life of their intimate partner.”