A Herndon man was sentenced in Fairfax County Circuit Court today to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the murder of his wife and a stranger he lured to their home through a fetish website.
Brendan Banfield, a former IRS law enforcement officer, claimed that he shot Joseph Ryan after he came across Ryan attacking his wife on the morning of Feb. 24, 2023. But earlier this year, a jury convicted him of murder after prosecutors argued that Banfield and the family’s au pair, Juliana Peres Magalhães, set Ryan up in a scheme to murder Christine Banfield, a pediatric intensive care nurse.