back to index

Crime News - October

A Chilling Picture of Accused Killer
 Crime: Vincent Sanchez studied his alleged victims, according to grand jury
transcripts.

  By CATHERINE SAILLANT and STEVE CHAWKINS, TIMES STAFF WRITERS

Accused rapist and killer Vincent Sanchez methodically studied his victims before he allegedly attacked them. But he became increasingly violent and reckless as his personal life fell apart and the attacks increased.

That picture of Sanchez emerges in 1,145 pages of Ventura County Grand Jury testimony that tells a chilling story of an alleged crime spree that terrified Simi Valley residents for five years and escalated to the slaying of 20-year-old Moorpark College student Megan Barroso. 

According to the transcripts, Sanchez, 31, made the effort to learn the names of some of his alleged victims. He allegedly videotaped one 15-year-old through her bedroom window as she changed into pajamas before attacking her. He often threatened his victims by mentioning a family member, the transcripts state.

"Do you want me to kill your grandmother?" he told one woman as he covered her mouth to stifle her screams, the testimony states.

Sanchez's alleged five-year hunt for victims across Simi Valley and the western San Fernando Valley was revealed in more detail last week when the grand jury testimony finally became public.

Prosecutors say the unemployed carpenter targeted 15 women beginning in September 1996 and ending with the kidnap and rape of a Woodland Hills woman July 9. That was five days after he allegedly gunned down Barroso as she
drove home from a Fourth of July party.

Sanchez, arrested in late July, faces trial on multiple sexual-assault charges and a first-degree murder count that could bring him the death penalty.

He has pleaded guilty to some of the assaults and his attorney has suggested he may admit to killing Barroso. But defense lawyer Neil Quinn has argued that Sanchez did not attempt to rape Barroso and thus should not face a possible death sentence in the case.

The transcripts show a brazen Sanchez, who allegedly broke into homes in the middle of the night by prying off window screens, breaking windows or slipping through sliding-glass doors.

Startled by a noise at 4 a.m., one woman, according to the transcripts, awoke to see a knife blade poking through her bedroom door jamb, working its way up toward her hook-and-eye lock. As she frantically tried to call 911, a man in
a ski mask rushed in, covered her mouth and held the blade to her throat.

He allegedly marched her, crouching, to a hallway window and tried to pull her through. But he fled when the woman screamed and her mother rushed to her aid.

Authorities say a pair of the woman's turquoise panties was later found among Sanchez's possessions. According to the transcripts, he grabbed "trophies" such as underwear, jewelry and cameras from many of the crime scenes.

Sanchez allegedly took sexually explicit pictures of some of the women, their faces shrouded by a hood. A man's shadowy figure, clad in a black ski mask and leather gloves, appears on some videotapes shot during the assaults.

"Make it sound good," the man ordered one of the victims.

The transcripts chronicle desperate--and sometimes effective--resistance from a number of Sanchez's alleged victims, who testified before the grand jury between Aug. 16 and Sept. 4.

One said she had flailed at her attacker as he allegedly straddled her, reaching under his ski mask to scratch him with her fingernails.

"I screamed and screamed very loud and he proceeded to try to exit my bedroom," the victim told the grand jury. "I saw he was fumbling with the doorknob, and I decided I wasn't gonna let him just walk out of the house. I proceeded to jump onto him, to jump onto his back and try to find out who he was."

One woman who had taken self-defense training became combative with her attacker. As she lay on her bed, she pulled her legs up and kicked her attacker's chest so hard that he fell back into a closet. They struggled. He ran down a hall and fled.

Sanchez allegedly surprised one victim by tackling her in the hallway of her home. She kicked him and bit his finger, but he beat her with his fists, slammed her face with an empty beer bottle and choked her until she passed out, according to the transcripts.

Regaining consciousness, she grabbed a family photograph in an oak frame.

"I just hit him on top of the head as hard as I could, and he stuttered and stumbled," the woman told jurors.

When her attacker saw her brandishing a metal lamp, he capitulated. 

"OK, OK, you win," he said. "I just have to find my mask."

After the attacks, according to the transcripts, Sanchez would sometimes try to soothe his victims, cuddling and whispering encouragement.

"You seem like a very good girl," the transcripts state he told one frightened woman he had allegedly taken from Topanga Canyon Boulevard in the San Fernando Valley and allegedly raped in his Simi Valley home. "You seem very pure. I can't believe I picked up someone as pretty as you."

Sanchez was "obsessed" with keeping his identity secret, prosecutor Lela Henke-Dobroth told jurors.

As the attacker raped the women, he kept their heads under a pillow. On several occasions he kidnapped his victims, driving them to his home or in one case to a dirt trail in the hills of Simi Valley. In those instances, he covered their heads with a sweatshirt.

Because he didn't have sexual intercourse with all his victims, transcripts state, Sanchez allegedly tried to minimize his attacks in a phone conversation from the Ventura County Jail to his former girlfriend.

"I didn't rape all of 'em," the transcripts state. "I just raped five or six of 'em."

The man who became known as the Simi Valley rapist was one of eight children raised by Margaret and Mariano Sanchez, say acquaintances interviewed by The Times earlier this year.

He Served Time for Child Abuse 

Mariano Sanchez worked in the construction business and both parents appeared to be strict but loving with the children, according to acquaintances.

But Vincent Sanchez had problems, dropping out of his Simi Valley high school. At 21, he moved to Lancaster and began a stormy relationship with a 17-year-old woman who had a child with another man.

They fought about the 1-year-old girl, court documents show, and in March 1992 both were charged with child abuse when the baby was rushed to Palmdale Hospital struggling to breathe. Sanchez served less than two years in prison
for the offense.

He moved back to Simi Valley after his release and began working in the construction business. In late 1995, Sanchez was injured in a crane accident and was awarded a sizable workers' compensation settlement.

After that, he never seemed to work much, Sanchez's roommates told the grand jury. During this time, Sanchez began dating Ojai resident Luz LaFarga. It is also the period when the rapes began.

His relationship with LaFarga, who was about 10 years older and had four children, was volatile, according to testimony.

Sanchez was jealous and obsessive with her, LaFarga said, sometimes driving to her home unannounced just to make sure she was there. Things deteriorated last winter, she said. Sanchez had broken into LaFarga's home once late at night, she said, and was peeping through windows on other occasions.

One night in December, LaFarga told grand jurors, Sanchez wielded a sword and fled before police arrived. LaFarga went to court to obtain a restraining order against Sanchez. The spiraling threats, and an apparent suicide note found by Sanchez's half-brother, Anthony Lopez, prompted his family to seek help.

In January, Lopez took Sanchez to Ventura County Medical Center, where he was treated for depression for 18 days, Lopez testified. Lopez, a career Marine Corps sergeant, later arranged a meeting between Sanchez and LaFarga in an
effort to settle their differences.

While the couple was talking, Lopez searched his brother's vehicle and found a black ski mask, gloves, handcuffs, ammunition--and a bag of female garments, Lopez told the grand jury. Lopez confronted Sanchez and demanded to
know whether he also had a firearm. Sanchez reluctantly took him to a nearby trash dumpster, where he had stashed a shotgun, Lopez testified.

Lopez testified he thought the items were related to Sanchez's threats against Luz, so didn't question his brother on why he had them.

Sanchez seemed to settle down for a few months, and during this time the attacks had stopped. But after five sexual assaults were reported in 2000, there were none through the first six months of this year.

But Sanchez never stopped calling LaFarga, and in June she finally made it clear that things were over between them. Sanchez went into a tailspin, neighbor George Fernandez said.

Sanchez Was Depressed Over Failed Relationship 

One night, Fernandez and Sanchez shared several beers while sitting on the lawn outside Sanchez's house, the neighbor testified. Sanchez began crying, telling Fernandez how he had recently held his roommate's AK-47 assault rifle to his mouth as he contemplated suicide.

He was depressed over his failed relationship with LaFarga, Fernandez said, and over something he could not tell his friend of six years about.

"He started crying, telling me that he almost killed himself and that he needed to get off the streets because he needed to go to jail," Fernandez testified.

When Fernandez pressed for details, believing Sanchez was talking about his threats against LaFarga, Sanchez was again vague.

"He said that he's done stuff that I wouldn't believe--if I found out then I would call the police on him," Fernandez said.

On July 4, Sanchez was drinking beers at home again, chatting with neighbors and his half-brother, Lopez. He did not seem unduly stressed, say neighbors who watched fireworks with him.

In the early morning, Sanchez apparently slipped into the night driving a dark-green Ford Ranger, say witnesses who noticed the vehicle was gone.

Across town in Newbury Park, Megan Barroso was also enjoying the holiday. She had spent the evening at a barbecue and later, watching fireworks at Silver Strand beach, her best friend, Lindsay Gross, told the grand jury.

One of Barroso's friends had brought a container of red glitter and playfully tossed some on Barroso's head. At 2:45 a.m., Barroso kissed Lindsay goodbye and headed toward her Moorpark home.

She never made it. Prosecutors say Sanchez fired the AK-47 he had allegedly stolen from his roommate and that one of the bullets ripped through Barroso's car and into her abdomen.

County Medical Examiner Ronald O'Halloran testified Barroso probably did not die immediately, instead bleeding internally for minutes or even hours. 

Forensic scientists later found evidence of blood and specks of red glitter in the truck that Sanchez was driving that night. Roommates said Sanchez appeared to have scratches on his face the next day and that he became very withdrawn, only coming out of his room at night.

Sanchez was arrested on suspicion of burglarizing a neighbor's home. While in custody, authorities said, Sanchez called one of his roommates and asked him to get rid of a bag he had placed in a recycling bin outside their Woodrow Avenue home.

Inside the bag, the roommate found photographs and videos of naked women bound and gagged, authorities said. Women's underwear and jewelry also were found in the bag. A roommate immediately called 911. 

Barroso's body was found Aug. 4 at the bottom of a 50-foot ravine in Black Canyon, just outside Simi Valley city limits. It was clad in a T-shirt and panties, with twine near the neck and waist, forensic officials said. 

O'Halloran testified he was unable to examine for sexual assault because the body was badly decomposed.

Henke-Dobroth told grand jurors that Sanchez had intended to kidnap and rape Barroso and decided to kill her because she could identify him.

"Unlike the other victims, she was the only one who would have been able to describe his physical characteristics, see his face and describe the pickup truck that he was driving," Henke-Dobroth told grand jurors. "Thus, he carried out the threat he had made to the others and Megan did not survive the attack."

Man believed to be Boston Strangler reburied after exhumation for second autopsy

 By Denise Lavoie, Associated Press, 10/29/2001 17:50
PEABODY, Mass. (AP) Albert DeSalvo, the man long believed to be the notorious Boston Strangler, was reburied on Monday after an exhumation for new testing that his lawyers hope will clear his name in the 1960s killings and solve the mystery surrounding his murder in prison.
A team of forensic scientists is conducting new DNA tests on DeSalvo's body tissue and examining the 16 stab wounds he suffered when he was killed in prison in 1973.
DeSalvo's family's lawyers hope to use the new test results to find his killer and to prove he did not kill Mary Sullivan. Police believe Sullivan was the Strangler's 11th and final victim.
DeSalvo confessed to killing 13 women, but died without ever being charged in the killings. He recanted his confession before he was murdered in prison while serving time on a rape charge.
A few investigators and the DeSalvo family are convinced that DeSalvo's confession was bogus and that he was not the real Boston Strangler. The DeSalvo and Sullivan families believe DeSalvo confessed because he hoped to make money from book and movie deals.
DeSalvo's body was exhumed from Puritan Lawn cemetery in Peabody on Friday, then examined over the weekend at York College in Pennsylvania, where scientists hope modern technology, including DNA typing, can help them identify DeSalvo's murderer and shed more light on whether or not he was the strangler.
Following a private gravesite ceremony for the reburial Monday, DeSalvo's family members said they hope the new round of testing, together with a second autopsy on Sullivan's body, will clear his name.
''So many different detectives have said he didn't do it. I even had one call me personally and say, `Michael, I know your father didn't do this,' '' said DeSalvo's son, Michael, 41.
''We've had this baggage hanging over our heads, and it just wasn't so,'' he said.
Three fellow inmates Carmen Gagliardi, Robert Wilson and Richard Devlin went to trial in DeSalvo's death, but two trials ended in a hung jury and mistrial. George Burke, a retired Massachusetts prosecutor who worked on the case, said he has no doubt the inmates killed DeSalvo because they wanted him to stay out of the prison drug trade.
George Washington University professor James Starrs, a forensic specialist who is conducting the second autopsy, said the results of the new testing would be ''blockbuster.''
The family of Sullivan joined DeSalvo's family in seeking a renewed look at the case. Sullivan's body was exhumed last year, and the results appeared to contradict DeSalvo's account of the slaying.
Starrs said the team expects to announce the results of a second autopsy on Sullivan's body in late November at a news conference in Washington, D.C.
''You will be amazed at the results,'' said Starrs, who has participated in other historical inquests, including examinations into the deaths of explorer James Meriweather Lewis and Jesse James.
Starrs would not say whether the forensic team's initial testing has proven that DeSalvo was not Sullivan's killer.
Elaine Whitfield Sharp, a lawyer for the DeSalvo family, said there are many contradictions in DeSalvo's confession to Sullivan's killing.
''While we, the lawyers, and the families believe it wasn't Albert, the scientists have to complete all of their testing before we can be certain of that,'' Sharp said.
Last year, Attorney General Thomas Reilly began reinvestigating Sullivan's murder at the request of the two families. But Ann E. Donlan, a spokeswoman for Reilly, said the investigation is stalled because DeSalvo's brother, Richard, refused to provide a DNA sample to compare with evidence found at the scene of Sullivan's murder.
DeSalvo's lawyers claim he has offered several times to give his DNA to Reilly's office if the attorney general would agree to share other evidence with them, including clothing, jewelry and biological materials found at the murder scene.
''We have an open criminal investigation in the Mary Sullivan homicide,'' Donlan said. ''It's the only credible law enforcement investigation on the matter. Despite their claims, they are not conducting the criminal investigation,'' she said.
''The scope of our investigation is not beyond that one particular homicide.''
York College was chosen for the second autopsy because its facilities were convenient to all the investigators.

Rewards' expected in DeSalvo autopsy
by Franci Richardson

Tuesday, October 30, 2001

The head of the forensic team that conducted a 12-hour autopsy of Albert DeSalvo's body over the weekend yesterday promised ``handsome rewards'' next month for the DeSalvo family, who are intent on exonerating the man known as the Boston Strangler, as well as finding his killer.
``The purpose of the exhumation is to see if we can't resolve an unsolved murder,'' James Starrs, lead forensic investigator said of DeSalvo's unsolved 1973 murder. ``The analysis we're conducting may also shed some light on the death of Mary Sullivan.''
The DeSalvo family and relatives of Mary Sullivan - the 19-year-old victim found strangled in her Beacon Hill apartment 37 years ago - have joined together to prove DeSalvo's innocence and push the attorney general to launch an aggressive investigation of his own.
``Once Albert DeSalvo's name is cleared, then we are going to demand a truly open and active investigation into Mary Sullivan's death,'' said Dan Sharp, a Marblehead attorney who represents the DeSalvos and Sullivans. ``(The state's) investigation has been a sham.''
But yesterday, a spokeswoman for Attorney General Thomas Reilly shot back, saying the independent forensic examinations of Sullivan and DeSalvo are irrelevant.
``There is only one credible investigation and that's being done by the attorney general's office,'' said spokeswoman Ann Donlan. ``As far as sham investigations, the only sham investigation is the so-called investigation they say they're doing.''
Starrs autopsied Sullivan's exhumed body in October 2000, and a source said his team is comparing a DNA sample taken from DeSalvo's brother, Richard, with semen found on her body.
Donlon said her office approached Richard DeSalvo through his attorney for a blood sample last year, but their offer was rejected.
``The only logical way to proceed is to do the biological testing,'' she said. ``We've asked for their help and they refuse to cooperate. We're still waiting. If they're interested in the truth, then they'll hopefully cooperate.''
DeSalvo had confessed to 13 murders before his death but was ready to publicly recant his confession the night before he was murdered.
His family believes the guards around the infirmary at Walpole state prison where he was held were accessories to his murder.
``To be killed inside a single prison cell, with all those guards around him, there is no way possible,'' DeSalvo's son, Michael, 41, said yesterday.
DeSalvo's relatives gathered yesterday at a Peabody burial ground as his body was reinterred. They hope testing over the next month will prove DeSalvo's innocence.
``All my life, I thought he was the Boston Strangler,'' said Michael DeSalvo. ``(Proving his innocence) would lift a big burden off my shoulders. I have full confidence in what everyone is doing here.''
Richard DeSalvo agreed.
``I know my brother. I know he was not a violent person,'' DeSalvo said.
``Put yourselves in our shoes. There isn't any place we go that as soon as you leave, people start talking about you,'' he added.
Richard DeSalvo said his brother repeatedly broke into people's homes to steal to support his family, and only confessed to 13 murders to receive the profits from a book and movie deal that was coordinated by his attorney, F. Lee Bailey.

Strangler DNA Could Clear Him

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

PEABODY, Mass.
The remains of the man believed to be the Boston Strangler were reburied yesterday after an exhumation for testing that could clear his name and solve the mystery surrounding his murder.


Forensic scientists who carried out the autopsy would not discuss what they had found but promised a blockbuster report when their research is complete, which could take up to a year.
Albert DeSalvo
Albert DeSalvo confessed to killing 11 Boston women in 1962-64 but recanted before being stabbed to death in prison while serving a rape sentence. He was never charged in the killings.

During a weekend autopsy at York College in Pennsylvania, a team of forensic scientists collected samples for DNA testing and examined the 16 stab wounds DeSalvo suffered when he was killed in prison in 1973.

A few investigators and the DeSalvo family, which requested the tests, are convinced that he was not the Boston Strangler.

Project leader and George Washington University Prof. James Starrs, a forensics specialist, said he already wants to increase the size of his team as a result of unexpected findings.

The family of Mary Sullivan, the strangler's last victim, has joined DeSalvo's family in seeking a new look at the case.

DeSalvo's family also hopes to clear up the circumstances of his death.

Three inmates were tried for the killing, but a jury failed to reach a decision in one trial and a mistrial was declared in another.

Prosecutors had said they believed the men were trying to keep DeSalvo from entering the prison drug trade.

Venue may change for Stayner

 Cary Anthony Stayner is due in Mariposa County Superior Court on Monday for a hearing that could result in his murder trial's move to another county.
October 28, 2001 Posted: 06:05:02 AM PST

By MICHAEL G. MOONEY

The scene is set Monday for what could be the final Mariposa County courtroom appearance of accused murderer Cary Anthony Stayner.
The 40-year-old Stayner is charged with murder, kidnapping, attempted rape and other charges in the February 1999 slayings of three Yosemite sightseers: Carole Sund, 42, of Eureka, her daughter, Julie, 15, and family friend Silvina Pelosso, 16, of Cordoba, Argentina.
The three had been visiting Yosemite National Park when they vanished from nearby Cedar Lodge, where Stayner once worked as a handyman.
Prosecutors have said they will seek the death penalty if Stayner is convicted.
On Sept. 13, 2000, in an unrelated case, Stayner pleaded guilty to the July 1999 murder of Yosemite naturalist Joie Armstrong. U.S. District Court had jurisdiction, because the crime occurred on federal land, and a judge sentenced Stayner to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
State and county prosecutors are handling the sightseers' case, which so far has been heard in Mariposa County Superior Court.
At Stayner's preliminary hearing in June, Judge Thomas C. Hastings heard the defendant's taped confession, in which he offered a chilling account of the slayings. The hearing ended with the judge ruling there was enough evidence for a trial.
Morrissey has petitioned the court to move the trial. Prosecutors say they will not oppose the change of venue.
It was not clear Friday where the Stayner trial might end up, or if the move, should Hastings approve it, would delay the proceedings. The trial is scheduled to begin Feb. 25.
Morrissey could not be reached for comment Friday. A spokeswoman at her Santa Monica office said she was en route to Mariposa.
In early August, Morrissey filed a 39-page change-of-venue motion in Mariposa County. She argued that "substantial and prejudicial" pretrial publicity about the murders of the Sunds and Pelosso had tainted the county's pool of potential jurors.
"The amount and emotional tone of the publicity in Mariposa County regarding this case makes prospective jurors more willing, consciously or subconsciously, to believe that Cary Stayner is guilty," Morrissey wrote.
She singled out stories from The Modesto, Sacramento and Fresno Bees, as well as the Mariposa Gazette, as examples of the "repeated and extensive reporting of evidence of Mr. Stayner's guilt."

By Tina Moore, Associated Press, 10/27/2001 16:23
PHILADELPHIA (AP) A team of scientists gathered at a central Pennsylvania college Saturday to perform an autopsy on the 28-year-old remains of the man who claimed to be the Boston Strangler to identify his killer and possibly prove his innocence in the murders.
The body of Albert DeSalvo was exhumed from his Massachusetts grave Friday and transported to a forensic laboratory at York College.
''The family has been unsatisfied all these many years concerning the death of Albert DeSalvo and failure to find anyone guilty of the death,'' said James E. Starrs, professor of forensic sciences at George Washington University who is heading the scientific team. ''They wanted a re-autopsy using some of the more modern techniques.''
Starrs said the scientific investigation is primarily to satisfy DeSalvo's family and help identify his killer, not to prove his innocence in the murders.
''Our primary motive is to determine whether the unsolved murder of Albert DeSalvo can be solved so the family can get closure. If there are any secondary benefits, we'll be glad to take them,'' Starrs said.
DeSalvo confessed to 11 murders in the greater Boston area between 1962 and 1964. He was blamed for two others.
He was never tried or convicted of the strangler murders, but was given a life sentence for unrelated crimes. He recanted his confession before he was stabbed to death in prison in 1973.
The families of DeSalvo and his reputed last victim Mary Sullivan don't believe DeSalvo was the Boston Strangler, and are looking for DNA and forensic evidence to make their case.
More than a dozen forensic experts will conduct an autopsy this weekend and collect DNA samples.
''This is still an unsolved murder. (Albert's brother) Richard would like to try to get some closure as to how his brother was murdered and possibly by who,'' said Elaine Whitfield Sharp, who represents both families. She accompanied the body from Boston and was at the small, private college about 20 miles south of Harrisburg on Saturday.
The DeSalvo and Sullivan families think DeSalvo confessed to the crime hoping to receive money from book and movie deals.
DeSalvo's second autopsy comes just over one year after that of Sullivan. Starrs headed a similar team to investigate her death.
DeSalvo claimed he raped Sullivan and strangled her with his hands, but his confession did not match the autopsy report, Sharp said. There was no semen evidence and no evidence she had been strangled by anything other than a nylon stocking and scarves, she said.
Mary Sullivan's nephew, Casey Sherman, has accused Massachusetts Attorney General Thomas Reilly of stonewalling the 37-year-old murder investigation because he wants to cover up prosecutors' past misdeeds. Sherman said that's why both families have pursued their own investigation.
''I think the DeSalvos want answers. What answers it may hold in Mary's case, we don't know yet,'' he said.
Sharp said other victims' families are also not convinced that DeSalvo killed their loved ones.
Sharp has been in a battle with Reilly over the release of investigation information and filed suit against him in September 2000, demanding DNA and crime scene evidence.
''The way we look at it is that the Sullivan family and the DeSalvo family have been forced to open old graves and old wounds because the attorney general wouldn't open old files,'' she said.
A telephone page to Reilly on Saturday was not immediately returned, but in the past the attorney general's office has said that the Sullivan murder is still an open case, and the office does not share evidence in an open case.
Sherman said his family is optimistic that the autopsy will lead to answers in the murder of his mother's sister.
''If DeSalvo did it, we want to know,'' he said. ''We don't think he did.''

Sunday October 28 02:00 AM EST

Serial killer demands gay porn in prison

SUMMARY: A man convicted of killing 12 young men at his home near London has argued that his human rights are being violated because he is not allowed to receive the gay soft porn magazine of his choice.

A man convicted of killing 12 young men at his home near London has argued that his human rights are being violated because he is not allowed to receive the gay soft porn magazine of his choice.

Lawyers for Dennis Nilsen, 54, argued before the High Court that other prisoners at Whitemoor top-security jail receive heterosexual soft porn publications, such as Razzle and Escort. But prison authorities have banned Nilsen's choice of magazines, Vulcan, because of the pictures inside.

The complaint was part of a hearing in which Nilsen challenged the prison's right to deny him access to the manuscript of his autobiography, "Nilsen: History of a Drowning Man," which he wants to edit.

The hearing has been adjourned for the filing of evidence.

Nilsen was incarcerated in 1983 after being convicted of murdering 12 young men, though many believe the number of victims, who were often homeless, is higher. He reportedly lured the men to his house, where he killed them and performed bizarre rituals on them.

He was reportedly caught after body parts he'd tried to flush down the toilet clogged the plumbing.

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/po/20011028/co/serial_killer_demands_gay_porn_in_prison_1.html 

Thursday, 25 October, 2001, 11:46 GMT 12:46 UK

At least 466 deaths are being investigated

Loren Herzog

October 24, 2001 Posted: 02:10:02 AM PDT

By MOLLY DUGAN
BEE STAFF WRITER

The San Joaquin County district attorney's office won murder convictions Tuesday against Loren Herzog in a killing spree that spanned 14 years.

Herzog, 35, will not face the death penalty, because the jury concluded that he did not intend to kill his three victims. His accomplice, Wesley Shermantine, did not fare as well: He is on death row, after his sentencing earlier this year.

Jurors in the Herzog case -- which was tried in Santa Clara County to escape pretrial publicity in San Joaquin County -- found him guilty of first-degree murder in three killings.

The former Linden resident faces 50 years to life in prison. Sentencing is scheduled for Dec. 10.

"We're extremely satisfied with the outcome," Deputy District Attorney Thomas Testa said. "I don't jump for joy when someone is convicted. But there is certainly a sense of relief that justice has been done."

Jurors spent more than two weeks in deliberations, and as time went on many observers speculated that the jury was hopelessly deadlocked.

"It's not unusual (to take so long) in a case of this magnitude," defense attorney Kenneth Quigley said. "They had a tremendous amount of evidence to consider."

When the jurors finally emerged with a verdict, some had tears in their eyes. One juror later hugged Herzog's wife, who sat in the audience for most of the trial.

Testa recalled that the mood of the courtroom was somber -- no dramatic outbursts, only sighs of relief from the victims' families when the guilty verdicts were announced.

Herzog was convicted in the deaths of Cyndi Vanderheiden, 25, Paul Cav- anaugh, 31, and Howard King, 35.

He was found guilty of being an accessory to murder in the case of Henry Howell; he was found innocent of the slaying of Robin Armtrout.

"It would have been considered a tremendous victory from the start to get anything less than a death sentence," Quigley said. "There's nobody who expected anything but five first-degree murder convictions and a death sentence."

Quigley said there is a chance that Herzog could eventually be released from prison.

Testa, however, said he believes the possibility of parole is remote and added: "I don't understand how spending the next 40 years in prison could be construed as a victory."

Shermantine, a childhood friend of Herzog's, was convicted in February of the same three murders and one other. Herzog's lawyers maintained that Herzog was an unwilling witness to Shermantine's crimes.

Testa said Shermantine will appear at Herzog's sentencing in December, and the deputy district attorney plans to ask him again to tell where Vanderheiden's body is hidden. The Clements woman disappeared in 1998.

Testa had planned to call Shermantine as a witness in the Herzog trial in rebuttal to defense testimony, but the defense did not present a case.

http://www.modbee.com/local/story/1059354p-1118505c.html 

Man arrested with two bodies in vehicle

A man has been arrested following the discovery of two female bodies in the back of a 4WD in Melbourne this morning.

Police said the man, aged in his 40s, was arrested at Mulgrave after police intercepted his 4WD and discovered the bodies about 1am (AEST).

A police spokesman said the man was being questioned by homicide detectives. No charges had been laid, he said.

Police set up a surveillance team around a house in Police Road, Mulgrave, about 9pm last night after the man claimed he had been held at gunpoint by another man, the spokesman said.

Police arrested the man after he left the house in his 4WD, he said. The identity of the two women or how they died is not yet known.

http://www.smh.com.au/news/0110/23/national/national101.html 

Monday, 22 October, 2001, 15:40 GMT 16:40 UK
Shipman's wife 'at victim's house'

The wife of serial killer Dr Harold Shipman might be forced to give
evidence at the public inquiry after it emerged she was present at the
house of one of his patients on the day she died.

The inquiry heard that when Irene Chapman died at home in March 1998 Harold
Shipman phoned her niece Celia Saxton to let her know.

When Celia Saxton phoned her aunt's house a few minutes later Shipman's
wife Primrose answered the phone. And when Celia Saxton's husband arrived
at the house Primrose Shipman opened the door. She said Harold Shipman had
had to go away to see another patient.

Later that day it emerged that two wedding rings were missing from Irene
Chapman's house.

On the cremation certificate Harold Shipman said his wife was present at
the death.
He said a post mortem was not necessary because he was there at the time of
death.

Interview

The Shipman Inquiry says attempts are now being made to interview Mrs Shipman.

She has provided a statement so far but has refused to answer questions
relating to Irene Chapman's death saying she has valid legal objections
which should excuse her from having to do so.

Counsel to the Inquiry, Caroline Swift QC told its head Dame Janet Smith:
"The Inquiry legal team is not prepared at this stage to accept Mrs
Shipman's refusal to answer the questions put to her by the Inquiry and it
will therefore be necessary for the validity of the objections raised by
Mrs Shipman to be fully argued before you."

The Inquiry says there will be a hearing on November 1 at which Mrs
Shipman's lawyers will be asked to explain why she is not prepared to
answer questions about Irene Chapman's death.

Mrs Shipman, a mother-of-four, who now lives near York, closer to
Franklands Prison in Co Durham where her husband is serving 15 life
sentences, will not be required to attend.



________________________________________________________________________

A boy whose dismembered torso was found floating in the Thames may have been the victim of a ritual killing,.

Officers are exploring the possibility of African witchdoctors using his body parts for magic potions.

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: "This is one of several lines of inquiry we are looking into - we are keeping an open mind."

The body of the Afro-Caribbean boy, who is thought to have been five years old and has yet to be identified, was spotted in the river near Tower Bridge in London last month. His arms, legs and head were missing.

Detectives are also not ruling out the possibility he could have been the victim of paedophiles, although there was no overt sign of a sexual attack.

They have also met Dutch police investigating the strikingly similar murder of a young white girl in Holland.

Dutch detectives have flown to London for a meeting with Scotland Yard officers, although as yet no firm link has been made.

The girl's dismembered body was found in a lake at Nulde and her head was found separately by a fisherman many miles away in the Hook of Holland.

The way in which both bodies were cut up has sparked fears a form of black magic practised in South Africa may have found its way to Europe.

Police in South Africa estimate hundreds of children may have been killed by witchdoctors practising a perversion of traditional "muti" medicine.

Story filed: 12:51 Tuesday 16th October 2001

http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_425094.html?menu=news.latestheadlines

Convicted Serial Killer Again On Trial In Pasco Death
From The Associated Press
Published: Oct 15, 2001

NEW PORT RICHEY - Six-time convicted killer Oscar Ray Bolin was preparing to face a jury Monday in a new trial for the 1986 death of a bank clerk.

The trial is the seventh for Bolin, who was convicted in the deaths of three Tampa-area women and suspected in several other slayings. Each of his murder convictions and death sentences were overturned twice by the Florida Supreme Court.

Now Bolin is on trial in Pasco County Circuit Court for the death of Teri Lynn Matthews. Many of those formerly associated with Bolin's cases say this trial represents the best chance prosecutors have of securing a conviction.

``I've always thought this case was the strongest,'' said Bob Attridge, who prosecuted Bolin the last time he stood trial in Pasco County. ``In this case, you have an eyewitness.''

But that eyewitness, Bolin's stepbrother Phillip Bolin, is unpredictable.

In 1992, Phillip Bolin told a spellbound jury how, as a 13-year-old boy, he watched his older brother beat a sheet-wrapped figure with a club outside a Land O'Lakes mobile home.

But when the Matthews case went to trial a second time in 1996, Phillip Bolin changed his story and said in an affidavit he was forced to lie. On the stand, he said he lied in the affidavit ``to make everybody happy.''

Attridge said there is still plenty of circumstantial evidence for a jury to consider.

Matthews, a 26-year-old bank clerk, was abducted from the Land O'Lakes Post Office, where Bolin rented a box. Her body was found wrapped in linens from St. Joseph's Hospital in Tampa, where Bolin's then-wife, Cheryl Jo Coby, was being treated.

At the time, Bolin was working for a tow truck company in Tampa. Tracks matching the pattern on Bolin's company issued wrecker were found near Matthews' body.

In addition, there was a partial match between semen found on Matthews' pants and Bolin. Experts have testified that there is a 1-in-2,000 chance the DNA pattern belonged to someone other than Bolin.

Bolin also faces retrial in the 1986 deaths of Natalie Holley, 25, and Stephanie Collins, 17.

Convictions and death sentences in those cases have been overturned because Bolin's former wife testified she helped him dispose of one body and heard him discuss a third slaying. The court said Oscar Ray Bolin never waived his spousal privilege and his wife's testimony was inadmissible.

New trial dates have not been set in the Hillsborough cases.

Regardless the outcome of the trials, Bolin will remain in prison on a 1987 rape conviction in Ohio.

FBI may join investigation into murders of 9 women
BY DOUG MOORE
Of the Post-Dispatch
10/11/2001 09:46 PM

Police in East St. Louis appear ready for the first time to accept aid from
the FBI to help solve the murders of nine women whose bodies have been
dumped there over the past two years.

"The FBI has lots of expertise that can lend credence to any
investigation," said East St. Louis Police Chief Delbert Marion, who was
promoted to the top job last month. "We're not too proud to accept
assistance from anyone."

FBI Agent Reginald Joseph said Thursday that he planned to extend an
invitation to help East St. Louis Police in the investigation. Despite
media accounts that mentioned his agency's involvement, Joseph said the FBI
has never had a role in the investigation.

A similar invitation to former Police Chief J.W. Cowan in spring last year
was never accepted, Joseph said. "Why he didn't accept the invitation, I
don't know," Joseph said.

Since that time, the bodies of four more women have been dumped in East St.
Louis, including two found this week, bringing the total to nine since Nov.
8, 1999.

Cowan could not be reached for comment. Last month, City Manager Harvey
Henderson removed Cowan as police chief. Cowan later retired, ending 31
years with the department, including two as chief.

Joseph said he would make a second invitation to Marion.

Marion, reached later, said he would be amenable.

"The more heads involved, the better," Marion said. "There is not one
individual who knows it all."

Marion said he was unaware of the first request by the FBI to get involved.

Joseph said the FBI could use its expertise in creating a profile of the
killer or killers responsible in the unsolved murders of the nine women and
compare them to other unsolved murders in the St. Louis area, including two
women whose bodies were found dumped along Highway 67 in West Alton this year.

"In my eyesight, this is a very serious problem," Joseph said of the nine
unsolved murders in East St. Louis. "These women belong to somebody.
Somebody out there cares about them."

Once a police agency contacts the local FBI office, federal agents can
summon forensic experts, psychologists and others who work on unsolved
murders at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Va., Joseph said.

Meanwhile, Marion said, the investigation into the two latest victims is
moving slowly. The body of Lolina Collins, 41, of Rock Hill, was found
Sunday morning in a lot in the 900 block of North First Street near the
National Stockyards. Her body, like at least three other women whose
murders remain unsolved, had been stuffed in a trash bag. She had been
strangled.

On Monday, the body of Brenda Beasley, 33, of the Baden neighborhood of
north St. Louis, was found in the 1500 block of Converse Avenue. She died
from a blow to the head.

"The leads that are coming in have been slow," Marion said. "It's been,
more or less, us trying to generate leads and trying to talk with family
members and friends. There's been no new progress."

Anyone with information should call East St. Louis police at 618-482-6767.

Wednesday October 10 10:33 AM ET

Killer of 100 Children in Jail 'Suicide'

LAHORE, Pakistan (Reuters) - A Pakistani man sentenced to be strangled, chopped into 100 pieces and dissolved in acid for the murders of dozens of children has been found dead in his cell in an apparent suicide, prison authorities say.

They said Tuesday the bodies of Javed Iqbal and his 14-year-old accomplice Sabir, who was convicted with him, had been sent to a hospital for a post-mortem examination.

``They have committed suicide by taking some poisonous substance,'' a jail official said in Lahore.

In March last year a Lahore judge sentenced both Iqbal and Sabir to be strangled, cut into pieces and thrown into acid -- the same fate that befell their 100 child victims.

The verdict provoked outrage from lawyers who said the judge had gone beyond Pakistani law which prescribes death penalty executions by hanging.

Iqbal initially confessed to committing what were the worst serial killings in Pakistan's 54-year history, but pleaded not guilty at his trial.

The apparent suicides came just four days after the country's highest Islamic Court had agreed to hear their appeal against the death sentence.

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20011010/od/killer_dc_1.html

Today: October 09, 2001 at 14:25:47 PDT
Black Woman's Body Found in Ill.

EAST ST. LOUIS, Ill. (AP) - Police say they have found an eighth body of a
slain black woman, the latest victim in a grim toll that has risen over the
past two years.

Police say they are not sure if the women were killed by the same person.

The woman found Monday was in her 20s or 30s and had her wrists and ankles
bound with duct tape. It was unclear if she was sexually assaulted, deputy
coroner Robert Shay said. She apparently died from a blow to the head.

The woman, who was not identified, was discovered on a residential street
about two miles from where the body of another woman was found Sunday. That
victim had apparently been strangled and stuffed into a plastic trash bag,
police said.

The bodies of six other black women have been found in the same general
area in East St. Louis since November 1999. Most were in areas frequented
by prostitutes and drug users.

Four of the victims, including the one found Sunday, were found with
plastic bags covering at least parts of their bodies, police said.

The change of venue in 2 murder cases also takes an emotional toll


October 7, 2001 Posted: 07:20:03 AM PDT

By MOLLY DUGAN
BEE STAFF WRITER
It's unclear how much money will be spent trying two high-profile murder cases in Santa Clara County, but it already has cost taxpayers more than a half-million dollars.
The trials of childhood pals Wesley Shermantine and Loren Herzog, which would have been expensive in San Joaquin County, have posed an even greater burden since being moved to one of the most expensive jurisdictions in Northern California.
"Ultimately, it comes out of the taxpayers' pocket," said Terrence VanOss, presiding judge for San Joaquin County. "Any trial is pretty expensive. When you take a long trial that is more complex, it's going to be even more."
Superior Court Judge Michael Garrigan ordered both death penalty cases moved because media attention made it impossible to put together an impartial jury, he ruled.
"I think it's a reasonable way to achieve a fair trial," VanOss said. "People want a first-class justice system and they're willing to pay for it."
The county spent $184,000 on travel, lodging and meals for the deputy district attorney prosecuting Shermantine.
Figures are not yet available for the Herzog case, but officials expect it to cost less because it has taken about two months, rather than three, to wind up. Closing arguments were given last week.
Further, the county hired a private attorney to defend Shermantine, at a cost of $274,552 including travel expenses. The public defender represents Herzog.
The cost for Shermantine's housing, meals and transportation to the courtroom was $24,415, which is higher than it would be in San Joaquin County, officials said.
Stephanie Larsen, deputy county administrator, said the additional travel costs are "scattered among half a dozen different budgets."
"But Santa Clara lodging is going to be expensive. Salaries of court staff (used) up there are going to be higher."
The court pays for the lodging, transportation and meals for the judge, his clerk, two court reporters and one bailiff, plus security for the Santa Clara courthouse.
Assistant Court Executive Rosa Junqueiro estimates that these extra costs for trying the Shermantine case in Santa Clara County were less than $200,000.
"When you look at the entire cost of the case, those costs are going to be minimal," she said. "The only costs that you would not have in Stockton are the travel for the staff that went there."
The court pays the transportation costs and lost wage fees to witnesses as well. An average of five to 10 witnesses per night need hotel rooms, the district attorney's office said.
And the costs may continue to mount after the Herzog trial ends.
San Joaquin County is required to pay the defense attorneys who represented Shermantine and Herzog for any assistance they provide to the attorney general or appellate court during the appeals.
What's clearer is the emotional toll the change of venue has created for witnesses and the families of the victims.
"It's such an enormous drive," said Thomas Testa, the deputy district attorney who is prosecuting both trials. "By the time the witnesses get to the courthouse, they're exhausted."
It can take up to four hours to get from Stockton to the Santa Clara courthouse.
Normally, San Joaquin County cases are transferred to Alameda County, which is located in a different media market. But an unrelated San Joaquin County case was already taking place there at the start of the Shermantine trial.
"Santa Clara was one of the few counties gracious enough to take us," Testa said. "But in terms of the commute, I cannot imagine any county that would be worse."
The family of 25-year-old Cyndi Vanderheiden, who was murdered in 1998, has attended both trials. Members live in Clements, a small town east of Lodi.
John Vanderheiden, the victim's father, comes to Santa Clara every day court is in session. He owns three businesses, and crams in most of the work during the weekends.
Still, the family has lost months of wages.
Teresa Vanderheiden, Cyndi's mother, takes unpaid days from her bank job to watch witness testimony.
"We want to see justice done," she said. "The only way they're going to know that someone cares is to see us there every day. It makes a big impact."
Shermantine was convicted in February in the deaths of Vanderheiden; Chevy Wheeler, 16; Paul Cavanaugh, 31, and Howard King, 35.
Herzog is charged with the murders of Vanderheiden, Cavanaugh and King, plus Robin Armtrout, 24, and Henry Howell, 45.

Prosecutors will not oppose venue change for Stayner


SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) -- Prosecutors will not oppose moving Cary Stayner's death-penalty murder trial out of Mariposa County, according to court documents.

In a two-paragraph response to Stayner's motion filed in August for change of venue, District Attorney Christine A. Johnson said a new trial site was warranted.

A hearing was scheduled for Oct. 29 in Mariposa, where Stayner is charged with the February 1999 murders of Yosemite tourists Carole Sund, 42; Silvina Pelosso, 16; and Juli Sund, 15.

Stayner's lawyer, Marcia A. Morrissey, had complained that Mariposa County's 16,000 residents could not be expected to produce a fair, unbiased jury pool for such a sensational, high-profile case.

Stayner, 40, already has pleaded guilty in federal court and been sentenced to life in prison without parole for the July 21, 1999, murder of Yosemite naturalist Joie Armstrong, 26.

Stayner trial can be moved, authorities say: The defense said an unbiased jury could not be found locally.By Wayne Wilson
Bee Staff Writer
(Published Oct. 6, 2001)

Prosecutors agree the death-penalty murder trial of Cary Anthony Stayner should not be heard in tiny Mariposa County.
In a two-paragraph response to Stayner's motion for change of venue, District Attorney Christine A. Johnson declared that selection of a new trial site is "warranted, given controlling legal precedent."
Johnson said she was not opposed to moving the case to a "county to be determined by this court after discussion with counsel."
A hearing on the change-of-venue motion is scheduled Oct. 29 in Mariposa, where Stayner is charged with the February 1999 murders of Yosemite tourists Carole Sund, 42; Silvina Pelosso, 16; and Juliana Sund, 15.
Stayner's lawyer, Marcia A. Morrissey, had complained that Mariposa County's 16,000 residents could not be expected to produce a fair, unbiased jury pool for such a sensational, high-profile case.
She alleged that "pretrial publicity in Mariposa County has been both substantial and prejudicial."
She called the crime's impact on the community considerable and enduring.
Stayner, 40, already has pleaded guilty in federal court and been sentenced to life imprisonment without possibility of release for the July 21, 1999, murder of Yosemite naturalist Joie Ruth Armstrong, 26.
His taped confession to the Sund-Pelosso slayings was played in court during a preliminary hearing in June.
But no deals have been offered by the state, which at trial will be seeking a death sentence based on six special circumstances, including multiple murder and murder during the commission of several sex crimes.
In a ruling issued Wednesday, Superior Court Judge Thomas C. Hastings denied a media request for access to Stayner's audiotaped confession, but he granted a motion filed by The Bee and others for public access to the transcript.
The judge noted that the audiotapes are filled with "salacious details" in Stayner's voice, that, if rebroadcast, could adversely affect both Stayner's right to a fair trial and the victims' rights to privacy.
He said, however, that the transcripts must be restored to the judicial record for inspection and copying "to fill a void in the record."
That void was created when both sides agreed to play the tape in court without the court reporter making a record of what was on the tape.
Without a transcript of the evidence offered on the tape recording, the public record of the preliminary hearing is incomplete, the judge noted.
Although the judge's order was signed Wednesday, the transcript was still in the custody of the district attorney late Friday and was not available for inspection, according to the court's executive officer, Mike Berest.

---------------------------------

The Bee's Wayne Wilson can be reached at (916) 773-7327, Ext. 22, or [email protected].


Stayner's own story released



October 6, 2001 Posted: 06:30:04 AM PDT

By MICHAEL G. MOONEY
BEE STAFF WRITER
A transcript of Cary Anthony Stayner's confession to the February 1999 murders of three Yosemite sightseers will be made public, probably early next week.
Superior Court Judge Thomas C. Hastings ordered prosecutors to make the transcript part of the official record, and, as a result, available for review by the public and news media.
A number of news media outlets, including The Bee, went to court in July to argue for the release of the transcript.
Hastings signed the order Wednesday but as of late Friday afternoon, the transcript had not been placed in the court file.
In a related matter, prosecutors have indicated they will not oppose a motion filed by Stayner attorney Marica Morrissey to move his trial outside of Mariposa County.
Court Executive Officer Mike Berest said on Friday that prosecutors filed papers with the court saying they will not try to block moving the trial.
Berest declined to comment further.
Members of the prosecution team -- Mariposa County Deputy District Attorney Kim Fletcher, George Williamson of the Solano County District Attorney's Office and Michael Canzoneri, a state deputy attorney general -- could not be reached for comment.
Morrissey contended vast pretrial publicity about the murders made it impossible for the 40-year-old Stayner to receive a fair trial in Mariposa.
A hearing on the request to move the trial is scheduled Oct. 29 at the Mariposa County Courthouse. Since the move is not opposed, the key issue becomes where in the state it should go to ensure a fair trial for Stayner.
Despite his confession, Stayner has pleaded innocent to murder, sexual assault and related charges in the killings of Carole Sund, 42, of Eureka, her daughter, Julie, 15, and family friend Silvina Pelosso, 16, of Cordoba, Argentina.
Stayner, if convicted, would face the death penalty.
Although he ordered the transcript made available, Hastings ruled that the media did not have the right to review tape recordings of the confession or make copies of those recordings.
The recordings were played in open court during Stayner's June preliminary hearing.

Attorneys claim DA distorted facts in Herzog murder trial


October 5, 2001 Posted: 05:55:02 AM PDT

By MOLLY DUGAN
BEE STAFF WRITER
SANTA CLARA -- Defense attorneys for Loren Herzog, the man on trial for five murders spanning 14 years, claimed the prosecution twisted the facts and lied about the evidence in the case.
During closing arguments Thursday, Kenneth Quigley accused the San Joaquin County district attorney of making a case against Herzog to please voters, not because the evidence pointed to him as a killer. He warned the jury not to "rubber stamp" the agenda of elected officials.
"In 20 years, I've never heard a prosecutor lie so blatantly," he said. "This case could have been over in a couple weeks. There's been a lot of irrelevant nonsense."
The prosecution brought up more than 100 witnesses over six weeks during Herzog's trial, which was moved to Santa Clara County because of pretrial publicity.
"Some of the witnesses are here to slander Loren Herzog without contributing to the understanding of what happened," said public defender Peter Fox. "The prosecutor misstated the evidence countless times."
Quigley and Fox spent several hours discussing the importance of the jury in the legal system and hunting for inconsistencies in the case delivered by Deputy District Attorney Thomas Testa.
"It's not the job of the defendant to prove he's innocent," Fox said. "The prosecution's case is full of assumptions and missing pieces."
The defense maintains Herzog was an unwilling witness to four of the crimes of childhood pal Wesley Shermantine. Defenders painted Shermantine as the dominant force in the friendship, a man who made the weak-willed Herzog live in fear.
Shermantine was sentenced to death in February for three of the five murders for which Herzog stands trial.
The family of Cyndi Vanderheiden, a 25-year-old woman Herzog and Shermantine allegedly killed, didn't buy that argument.
"There is evidence of (Herzog's) participation," said her father, John Vanderheiden.
Quigley and Fox argued that Herzog's statements, not the evidence brought forth by witnesses or forensics, are the heart of the case. They said four of the murders would have remained unsolved if Herzog hadn't come forth with information after he was questioned in Vanderheiden's disappearance. Her body has never been found.
Defense attorneys said they didn't need to call any witnesses for their case because the prosecution hasn't met its burden of proof. They claimed all the crimes were the work of Shermantine, armed with a shotgun against the unsuspecting and, in two cases, intoxicated victims.
Fox said Herzog cowered in the car, too terrified to help his friend Cyndi Vanderheiden as she was being raped and beaten in November 1998.
During the 1984 murder of Henry Howell, and later, those of Paul Cavanaugh and Howard King, Herzog stood by in silent horror, Fox said.
Defense attorneys claimed Herzog has no knowledge of the death of Robin Armtrout, 24, in 1985.
Much of the case rests on whether the prosecution can convince the jury that Herzog was involved in the crimes that ultimately led to the murders, such as rape and armed robbery.

Man held in seven killings indicted on 46 new countsBY RODNEY FOO
Mercury News
A man accused of killing seven people in crimes stretching from San Jose to Southern California has now been indicted by a federal grand jury on 46 counts of racketeering, murder and assault, the U.S. Attorney's Office said Thursday.
But whether 26-year-old Anh The Duong will ever be tried in a state or federal court is unknown. Last month, Duong, who was being held in a Los Angeles County Jail, slashed his wrists with a makeshift knife. He is now at a Southern California hospital being kept alive with the aid of a respirator, authorities said.
The San Jose-based grand jury also indicted 10 others, including two San Jose men: Ricky Vong, 26, and 32-year-old Cuong ``Eddie'' Vuong, who is serving a sentence in state prison for the 1998 slaying of a Fremont high-tech executive during an attempted robbery at Wintec Industries.
Three men are still at large. The others are in custody on other charges.
Authorities have pinpointed Duong as the ringleader, allegedly enlisting them to help him pull off crimes from Northern California to Las Vegas.
Sowein Chan and A. Philip Garza, both of Santa Ana, are in custody and charged with Duong in the March robbery of a Cupertino jewelry store in which security guard Josefino Cambosa, 54, was fatally shot.

Suspect lied to police, jury told in Herzog case


October 4, 2001 Posted: 05:35:02 AM PDT

By MOLLY DUGAN
BEE STAFF WRITER
SANTA CLARA -- Prosecuting attorneys presented an array of conflicting statements and outright lies Loren Herzog gave during the investigation into five murders for which he now stands trial.
During closing arguments Wednesday, Deputy District Attorney Thomas Testa brought out transcripts that showed Herzog trying to evade questions from the San Joaquin County sheriff. Any claim by Herzog is bound to be another lie, more of his "selective memory," Testa said.
"His goal is to get out of this, not to tell the truth or set the record straight," Testa said. "It doesn't make sense that it was all (done by) Wesley Shermantine and not Loren Herzog."
Defense attorneys, who did not present any witnesses or evidence, argued during opening statements that Herzog, 34, was an unwilling witness to the crimes, a man too scared of his childhood friend Shermantine to come forward with the truth.
Shermantine, 35, was convicted of four murders and sentenced to death last May.
The prosecution in the Herzog case spent much of its last words to the jury showing the close friendship that Herzog and Shermantine maintained during the 14 years spanning the crimes.
They lived together at two different times in the mid-1980s. Witnesses say they saw the pair together many times over the years. A photo of them with their arms around each other's shoulders hung in the courtroom.
"The evidence shows that they acted like partners before, during and after the crimes," Testa said. "The claim that Herzog was scared is totally contradictive of their relationship at that time."
The prosecution maintained that drug use was a main component of their friendship. Witnesses said both men were high on methamphetamine the night 25-year-old Cyndi Vanderheiden disappeared in November 1998.
Even if Herzog wasn't the one who beat the life out of Vanderheiden, Testa said, he participated enough to be charged with her death.
Herzog lured Vanderheiden into Shermantine's car, then helped him dispose of her body, Testa said. The body has not been found.
Herzog provided explicit points
In his statements to police, Herzog laid out the details of her death.
"He certainly saw a lot for someone sitting in the back seat in a daze," Testa said in response to the defense's argument that Herzog wasn't able to stop her murder.
"This incident didn't happen in a vacuum." The murders of Robin Armtrout, Henry Howell, Paul Cavanaugh and Howard King in 1984 and 1985 were also masterminded by the two men, the prosecution said. Shermantine, who has been accused of bragging about 24 murders, was not tried in the deaths of Armtrout or Howell.
Armtrout was last seen riding in a red truck between two men before her naked body was discovered near Potter Creek with nearly 50 stab wounds. Her clothes, which were held up in the courtroom, were found piled neatly next to her.
Forensic evidence shows that the murders of Cavanaugh and King had to be committed by at least two men -- King's 250-pound body was dragged out of a car after the pair was shot to death in an apparent ambush near a wastewater treatment plant.
And it likely took two men to hold down and beat Howell, a man with a violent history and temper who knew how to fight back. He was reportedly lying drunk on the side of the road when Shermantine and Herzog allegedly robbed, beat and killed him.
The prosecution presented pictures of the bloodied and bruised bodies of the earliest victims. Vanderheiden's body has not been found.
"I've heard it so much, I'm numb to it," said John Vanderheiden, Cyndi's father. He added that the prosecution presented no new information to the jury during the closing arguments, but did emphasize Herzog's track record of lies.
"I'm sure the closing arguments cleared up a lot of doubts for the jurors," he said.
The defense is scheduled to begin its closing arguments this morning.

Serial killer may be on the loose in KZN
Posted Tue, 02 Oct 2001

Durban North police are investigating the possibility that another serial killer may be on the loose in KwaDukuza after the bodies of six women and a baby were found in sugarcane fields.
Police Superintendent Vasie Naidu said sugarcane cutters discovered the skeletal remains over the past two months while burning the sugarcane fields in the Umvoti Tri Sand and Gledhow areas.
Two of the bodies were discovered in the Tri Sands area and five in the Gledhow area.
Naidu said the women were all in their thirties.
The first body of a 35-year-old woman was found near Umvoti Tri Sands on July 26.
On August 19, the body of a 30-year-old woman whose throat was slit, was discovered in a bushy area near the Umvoti River Bridge, about 800m from where the first body was discovered.
A month later police discovered the burnt skeleton of a woman in a sugarcane field in the Gledhow area, about eight kilometres away from where the first two bodies were found.
On September 27 the burnt skeleton of a woman and a baby were found in the same area, 600m away from the third body.
The last two badly decomposed and burnt skeletons were discovered 200 metres apart in the Gledhow area on Monday, Naidu said.
She said police were still determining whether they were dealing with another serial killer.
The Riverman Project Team is investigating the killings.
The team is investigating the River Man serial killer who killed at least 13 women since 1999 and dumped their bodies into the Umhlangeni River, in Newlands East, north of Durban. - Sapa

CNN applies to televise Shipman inquiry

BY FRANCES GIBB CNN has lodged a formal request for permission to televise the Shipman inquiry. In the first such case involving the Human Rights Act 1998, the international news channel lodged its application on the ground of public interest.

Mrs Justice Smith, who is chairing the inquiry, has set aside October 11 to hear the case on camera access. CNN said it wanted to shed light on the inquiry, which is investigating the deaths of at least 466 patients of the former GP Harold Shipman, from Hyde, Greater Manchester, who is serving a life sentence for the murders of 15 patients.

A CNN spokesman said that public interest would be served best by allowing cameras to show how the standard protection systems had failed, to ensure that such a failure did not happen again. The inquiry resumes on October 8.

Investigator believes Stayner had accomplice

September 30, 2001 Posted: 06:45:01 AM PDT

By MICHAEL G. MOONEY
BEE STAFF WRITER
Did Cary Anthony Stayner act alone?
That question is being raised again, as the one-time motel handyman sits behind bars, awaiting trial on charges that he single-handedly and savagely killed three Yosemite sightseers.
Stayner, who already has been sentenced to life in prison for the grisly murder of Yosemite naturalist Joie Armstrong, is the only one charged in the February 1999 slayings of Carole Sund, 42, of Eureka, her daughter, Julie, 15, and family friend Silvina Pelosso, 16, of Argentina.
But many people, including family and friends of the victims, continue to be convinced that Stayner could not and did not act alone in the brutal killings.
Francis and Carole Carrington, the parents of Carole Sund and grandparents of Julie, long have believed that Stayner had accomplices.
"So far," Francis Carrington said Friday, "we haven't been able to pin anything down."
But a Calaveras County bounty hunter believes a convicted child molester he tracked down in mid-1999 played a role in the deaths of the Yosemite sightseers.
Stephen Sanzeri of Murphys has told authorities they should take a long look at Paul Leckey Candler Jr. Sanzeri believes Candler was involved in the murders, based on statements he said Candler made to him and private investigator Rick Janes. The pair arrested Candler in June 1999 in Alabama after he jumped bail in Tuolumne County on charges unrelated to the Yosemite slayings.
Since June 2000, Candler has been at the California Correctional Institution at Tehachapi, where he is serving a 17-year sentence for continuous sexual abuse of a 12-year-old.
Candler's name surfaced briefly during the height of the FBI-led investigation, but authorities at that time said they did not consider him a suspect.
But Rhonda Dunn, a Chicago woman who told The Bee last year that Stayner and two or possibly three other men stalked her, has identified Candler as one of those men.
The Sunds and Pelosso vanished Feb. 15, 1999, from the Cedar Lodge in Mariposa County. They were on an excursion to Yosemite National Park.
Their bodies were discovered about a month later at separate locations in neighboring Tuolumne County.
The charred remains of Carole Sund and Pelosso were found in the trunk of their burned-out rental car. Julie Sund's body was discovered on a wooded hillside overlooking Don Pedro Reservoir. Her throat had been slit.
Similarities abound
For months, the FBI investigation focused on a loosely knit group of drug users and career criminals, and on a number of occasions, authorities announced that they believed the people responsible for the crimes were in custody.
Then, in July 1999, Joie Armstrong was found dead, the victim of a grisly decapitation. The trail led to Stayner, who shocked authorities by telling them he had killed the three sightseers.
Stayner subsequently reached a plea bargain and was sentenced to life in prison for Armstrong's murder. He is awaiting trial in the sightseers' deaths, and, if convicted, could receive the death penalty. Stayner is scheduled to return to court Oct. 29 for a hearing to determine whether the trial should be moved from Mariposa County.
Sanzeri and Janes continued to believe that Stayner did not act alone. They said they tried for months to get law enforcement to listen to their theory about Candler.
"Neither one of us know Stayner," Janes said. "But we have talked to people who know him, and they said he couldn't have done it by himself."
No one paid much attention to Sanzeri and Janes until Sept. 6, when they were interviewed by a Mariposa County sheriff's detective assigned to the Sund-Pelosso investigation.
Lt. Brian Muller, a spokesman for the Mariposa County Sheriff's Department, confirmed Friday that a detective interviewed the pair.
Muller said the investigation remains open and, as a result, he could not comment further on Candler.
He did say, however, that information on the possibility of someone else being involved in the Sund-Pelosso murders is being investigated thoroughly.
Sanzeri said the description in The Bee's story about Dunn in May 2000 prompted him to contact authorities.
Dunn had described being stalked in July 1998. At the time, Dunn, a respiratory therapist, and her mother were staying at Cedar Lodge.
Dunn described one of the men she saw with Stayner as 5-foot-6 to 5-foot-7.
Sanzeri said Candler stands 5-foot-7 to 5-foot-8.
Dunn said the man she saw had medium to long wavy, blond hair.
Sanzeri said Candler has medium-length, wavy, light brown hair.
Dunn said the man she saw had an elaborate tattoo on his right forearm with a devil.
Sanzeri said Candler has an elaborate tattoo on his right forearm and a she-devil tattoo on his left forearm.
Dunn said the man who followed her had a funny walk, almost bowlegged. "He reminded me of Cornelius, one of the characters in the movie 'Planet of the Apes.'"
Sanzeri said Candler is bowlegged.
Dunn said the man who followed her was driving an older blue Ford F-150 pickup.
Sanzeri said he and Janes saw an older blue Ford F-150 pickup parked at Candler's former residence in Arnold.
Dunn said she saw the man hanging around Cedar Lodge. She is convinced he was the same man who played "bumper tag" with her car as they drove toward Yosemite.
Once in front of her car, Dunn said the man repeatedly sped up and slowed down. She said she eventually passed the pickup and got away.
After reading the newspaper story, Sanzeri contacted Dunn through a Eureka attorney who represents Jens Sund, Carole Sund's husband and Julie's father.
Sanzeri said he asked Dunn about the man she saw with Stayner.
Dunn was able to pick Candler's picture out of a photo lineup Sanzeri prepared and mailed to her.
Sanzeri said no tattoos were visible in any of the pictures Dunn reviewed.
In addition, Dunn told Sanzeri that the man she saw was wearing a black T-shirt, blue Levi jeans and cowboy boots.
Sanzeri said Candler was wearing a black T-shirt, Levis and cowboy boots when arrested in Alabama a year later.
Dunn recently told The Bee she remains convinced Candler followed her and her mother that day in July 1998.
"I'm sure it was him," she said. "He was a lot more aggressive toward me than Stayner."
Candler felt sorry for victims
Sanzeri said he first encountered Candler in November 1998 when he posted two bail bonds for the former Atwater and Modesto resident. Candler's girlfriend at the time, Barbara Dobbins, requested the bonds, Sanzeri said.
Attempts to contact Dobbins were unsuccessful.
Sanzeri said Candler had several brushes with the law, including convictions on weapons, drugs and false imprisonment charges.
Two months after the Sund and Pelosso slayings, in April 1999, Candler and Dobbins canceled their post office boxes in the Tuolumne County community of Moccasin. A short time later, Sanzeri said, Candler jumped bail and the two left the state.
Sanzeri and Janes tracked the couple to Warrior, Ala. As they tried to take them into custody on June 5, 1999, Sanzeri said, the couple sped away in a car with Candler driving.
On June 6, Sanzeri and Janes said they returned to the house and found Dobbins alone.
"She was very hysterical," Sanzeri said. "It took us 15 minutes to settle her down for a half-decent conversation."
Sanzeri continued: "After she calmed down, I asked her why she and (Candler) had evaded us. (Dobbins) stated to us that (Candler) thought we were the 'feds' and were looking for him regarding the girls that were murdered."
Dobbins then told Sanzeri that Candler "felt bad about what happened to the girls."
Sanzeri and Janes said they caught up with Candler on June 7 at a motel. Sanzeri said Candler initially refused to come outside.
When Candler came out, Sanzeri said, a scuffle ensued in front of Janes and several police officers who had come to assist with the arrest.
Candler was taken to a nearby hospital for treatment of what Sanzeri called "minor injuries."
While at the hospital, Janes asked Candler why he ran away. The private investigator said Candler told him he believed Janes and Sanzeri were FBI agents investigating the death of the sightseers.
Janes said Candler told him he felt sorry for the girls.
Investigators believe in theory
Sanzeri and Janes -- who are ex-police officers -- said the statements by Candler and Dobbins are significant because they were made without any prompting.
The investigators said they are willing to take lie-detector tests.
Sanzeri said he has only a theory at this point. He has no physical evidence to connect Candler to Stayner, let alone the deaths.
Still, he believes Candler -- at the very least -- has information about the killings.
Sanzeri said Candler and Dobbins had been staying in a remote cabin on Grizzly Road -- less than two miles from where Julie Sund's body was discovered.
On Feb. 22, 1999, Sanzeri said, a fire damaged a portion of the cabin. It was about a week after the Yosemite sightseers were seen alive.
Bee staff writer Michael G. Mooney can be reached at 578-2384 or [email protected].

Serial Killer Wants to Stay in Jail Forever

Monday October 1, 2001

LONDON (Reuters) - Convicted serial killer Rosemary West has been quoted as saying she wants to spend the rest of her life in jail.

West, found guilty in 1995 of murdering 10 young women, including her own daughter, has instructed her lawyer to withdraw an appeal against her conviction, a statement published in the Mail on Sunday said.

``I do not believe that even if I was released that I could ever relax or feel free, be left alone or have any peace of mind,'' her statement said.

``More importantly, I would not be able to resume a normal relationship with my family.''

West became the most reviled woman in Britain after the dismembered remains of nine young women were found in 1994 at the ``House of Horrors'' -- 25 Cromwell Street in Gloucester.

She was given 10 life sentences for the murders and told by judge Charles Mantell: ``If attention is paid to what I think, you will never be released.''

Her husband Fred was also charged with 12 murders but committed suicide before he could face trial.

In her statement, West said she wanted to apologize to her daughter Anne-Marie -- whom the couple had sexually abused from the age of eight and forced into child prostitution.

``Anne-Marie is part of my family and I would love to be reconciled to her and have contact with her,'' she said.

She also attacked Channel 5 for screening a documentary which featured recorded confessions made by her husband dubbed the ``Fred West tapes.''

``It can only open old wounds or delay any healing process for victims' families,'' she said. 

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20011001/od/west_dc_1.html

Fred West 'admitted 20 more murders'

Matt Wells, media correspondent
Thursday September 27, 2001
The Guardian

A documentary maker yesterday called for a public inquiry into claims that the serial killer Fred West, who is known to have killed at least 12 young women, confessed to 20 more murders.

David Monaghan said he would write to the home secretary and the attorney general about West's confessions, made to the social worker assigned to him in prison and repeated in a Channel 5 series to be broadcast next week.

Gloucestershire police, who have always maintained there was not enough evidence to investigate the claims, last month failed in an appeal to the attorney general to have the programme blocked.

In a move that has already caused controversy, the film will broadcast excerpts from West's taped interviews with detectives and his solicitor. It also shows clips from home movies made by West and his wife Rose. In one extract, West describes in graphic detail to detectives how he buried body parts in a hole in his garden.

He says: "I thought, Shit, I can't get her down through there. I thought, I'm going to have to cut her up again, and by this time I'm realising that's three, no two, not three, where is this going to stop? I've got to give myself up, I've got to tell Rose so I don't do this again."

West also describes how the "spirits" of his victims haunted him when police searched his Gloucester home. He says: "When they come up into you it's beautiful, it's when they go away you are trying to hold them, you feel them flying away from you and you try to stop them."

According to Janet Leach, a trainee social worker assigned to West after he was arrested, he admitted to many more deaths.

"Fred said that there were two other bodies in shallow graves in the woods but there was no way they would ever be found. He said there were 20 other bodies... spread around and he would give police one a year."

He said he had picked up Mary Bastholm, who disappeared aged 15 in 1968, at a bus stop and she was buried in a village called Bishop's Cleve.

At a preview of the documentary, made by the Creative Consortium, yesterday, Mr Monaghan said: "Certainly I want a public inquiry. All of that evidence should have been laid out at the trial." West hanged himself in prison on New Year's Day, 1995, before he could be tried.

The series will show home videos made by Fred of his wife having sex with other men. The extracts were not graphic, Mr Monaghan said.

David Canter, professor of criminology at Liverpool University, who holds the academic rights and appears in the documentary, said the programme should be shown so that serial killers could be better understood.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,558661,00.html

Ross pleads guilty to New York killing

(Goshen, NY-WTNH, Sept. 24, 2001 UPDATED 4:50 PM) _ Convicted serial killer
Michael Ross pleaded guilty Monday to killing a teen-ager from New York.

Michael Ross pleaded guilty to first degree manslaughter charges in the death
of 16-year-old Paula Perrera.

In making the plea, Ross admitted killing the girl in 1982 while "acting
under extreme emotional disturbance," District Attorney Frank Phillips said.

Phillips says he spoke with the Perrera family two weeks ago and they wanted
the case to be over with as soon as possible. The family agreed that since
Ross is already on Connecticut's death row, a guilty plea on manslaughter
would be acceptable.

Ross is sitting on Connecticut's death row for the murders of four women from
New London County. He is also serving two life sentences for the deaths of
two women from Windham County.

He will be sentenced October 22nd in Orange County Court for the Perrera
killing.

Phillips expects Ross to get the maximum 25 year prison sentence.

Missing women raise fears of serial killer
Vancouver police say many more women among the disappeared on east side.

The Canadian Press
The Associated Press

VANCOUVER (CP) -- City police say as many as a dozen more women may be added to a list of 31 who have mysteriously disappeared from the city's tough, drug-infested downtown eastside.

The new cases haven't formally been added to the list, but the increased number has prompted renewed fears and questions about whether the disappearances are the result of a serial killer.

But police spokeswoman Const. Sarah Bloor was cautious about the possibility.

"We just don't have any concrete fact to suggest that," Bloor said.

"Certainly, we have a number of missing women. But we don't have any crime scene or any method...that would suggest a pattern in which this is done.

"What we have is are women that are from the same type of area and perhaps in a similar lifestyle that would lead us to that, but we don't have any forensic evidence that we can sort of lead to a suspect."

Some police officers have privately acknowledged a serial killer is a strong possibility.

If one culprit is responsible for all the disappearances, it would put the crimes in league with Washington State's Green River killer, who is believed to have murdered 49 prostitutes and has never been caught.

Among the new cases, one dates back to 1985; four are from the 1990s and the rest are from 2000 and 2001.

A joint forces team of 10 RCMP and Vancouver city police personnel is reviewing the new cases to see if they fit the profile and should be added to the list of 31.

The team, formed earlier this year, replaced a stalled police department investigation begun in 1998 to look into the disappearances of the women, most of whom were involved in drugs and prostitution. Complicating things is the fact that many of them were transient.

The Vancouver Sun reported Friday police have quietly increased the size of the team to 16 officers.

The force has come under consistent criticism from community and sex-trade activists who complain that if the missing women were from the city's more affluent west side, the police would have acted long ago.

Bloor said that's not fair.

"We don't have any crime scenes. We don't have anything like that to assist us in collecting more evidence," she said.

In a front-page investigative report in the Vancouver Sun on Friday, police Chief Terry Blythe said he will be making a special request to city council for more money to cover the cost of the additional officers for up to a four-year period.

But Erin McGrath, of Vancouver Island, told the newspaper she has been asking police for a year why her missing sister, Leigh Miner, has not been added to the list.

McGrath said she is grateful police are now considering that step, but said she was never given a straight answer in the past.

Miner, a heroin addict who was known to work as a prostitute, was reported missing by her mother in the spring of 1994 after vanishing from the streets of Vancouver.

McGrath said her family never received any phone calls or updates from the missing person's unit.

"We tried to maintain some sort of relationship with the police...but we felt like we were disturbing them," she said.

Families and activists are also concerned there aren't enough detectives from the Vancouver city police department assigned to the case.

The joint task force with the RCMP has been concentrating on a file review of all prostitute murders, attempted murders and sexual assaults across the province and are checking for links to the missing women cases.

Senior officers with the team told the Sun the 10-person team has no responsibility for the active investigation of new cases.

That work is still being handled by the local police agencies.

A significant number of the files are the responsibility of the Vancouver police department's missing persons section, which means there are just two detectives working the freshest leads in what is potentially the largest serial murder case in the city's history.

Police have located the bodies of a number of murdered prostitutes over the years.

A review of newspaper and police files found there have been more than 60 murders of prostitutes in B.C. over the past two decades and at least 35 of those remain unsolved.

Investigators are now looking at some of those cases to see if they could be connected to the disappearances.

Robinson's lawyers seek trial delay, plan to request change of venue
By TONY RIZZO - The Kansas City Star
Date: 09/20/01 22:15
John E. Robinson Sr.'s trial, scheduled to begin in January, should be delayed until September 2002, his lawyers say in court papers filed Thursday.
With Johnson County prosecutors seeking the death penalty for Robinson's alleged involvement in the deaths of two women, his new lawyers say "the interest of justice will be served" by the delay.
"Given the severe nature of the possible punishment, and its irreversible consequences," said Robinson's lead counsel, Bob Thomas, and the lawyers appointed to assist him, Patrick Berrigan and Sean O'Brien, they cannot be ready for trial by Jan. 14.
They also indicated for the first time Thursday that they will seek a change of venue. They hope to file that request in December.
Robinson's former attorneys from the Kansas Death Penalty Defense Unit, who had represented him for a year, were replaced in July when he hired Thomas. Berrigan and O'Brien were appointed by the judge to assist Thomas a few days later.
All three have major trials coming up between now and Robinson's trial, which was scheduled before they entered the case.
Among their previous commitments is Berrigan's representation of Keith D. Nelson, who faces kidnapping and sexual abuse charges in the death of 10-year-old Pamela Butler. His federal death penalty trial is set to begin in October.
District Attorney Paul Morrison said Thursday that he would object for the record to the Robinson delay, although he said everyone involved understood that Robinson's lawyers need to have adequate time to prepare.
"But we are very interested in trying Mr. Robinson as soon as possible," Morrison said.
A hearing is scheduled for this afternoon at the courthouse in Olathe.
Robinson, 57, of Olathe, has been jailed since June 2000, when the bodies of two women were found in barrels on property he owned in Linn County, Kan.
Morrison's office also charged Robinson with killing another woman in 1985 and arranging the phony adoption of the woman's infant daughter.
Authorities in Cass County charged Robinson with the deaths of three other women found there in barrels. That case is on hold until after the prosecution in Kansas.
Robinson's lawyers said that in coming months they plan to file motions challenging the constitutionality of the Kansas death penalty law.

To reach Tony Rizzo, Johnson County court reporter, call (816) 234-7713 or send e-mail to [email protected].

Bar-Jonah trial set for February
By KIM SKORNOGOSKI
KIM SKORNOGOSKI Tribune Staff Writer
---------------------------------
Nathaniel Bar-Jonah's trial for allegedly sexually assaulting three Great Falls boys has been tentatively set for Feb. 12 in Butte.
Days before he was to be tried Sept. 10, his lawyers convinced District Judge Kenneth Neill to postpone the trial a third time, saying they hadn't had enough time to look at the mounds of evidence.
Don Vernay of Kalispell and Gregory Jackson of Helena, his attorneys since January, said going through the evidence was useless without the computer databank being prepared by the FBI to organize it.
Bar-Jonah, 44, has been in jail 21 months; he has never gone to trial.
The February trial is on charges of kidnapping, assault with a weapon and three counts of sexual assault.
He also has been charged with kidnapping and murdering 10-year-old Zachary Ramsay, tampering with a witness and impersonating police in 1997.
Initial charges of impersonating a police officer and concealing a stun gun near Lincoln Elementary School were dropped.
The trial is expected to last two to three weeks with 14 jurors selected from a pool of 200.
If convicted, he faces a maximum 340 years in jail.

SEPTEMBER 17, 01:51 EDT
Convicted Murderer Escapes in Miss.

NEW AUGUSTA, Miss. (AP) - A convicted murderer who was to stand trial Monday
for a 1995 stabbing death escaped from jail with his cellmate after they
used a hacksaw blade to cut through an air-conditioning duct, officials
said.

Authorities searched Sunday for Kenneth Moody, 26, and cellmate Scotty
Thomas, 33, but they remained at large.

Perry County Sheriff Carlos Herring said they somehow obtained a hacksaw
blade to cut through the duct. He said they climbed through the duct and
onto the jail roof before jumping to the ground.

No vehicles were missing at the jail and it was possible someone had been
waiting in a car for the two men, he said. The escape occurred late
Saturday.

``It appeared to be pretty well planned and, while we are searching this
area, it is possible they are trying to get out of the country,'' Herring
said.

Authorities said both men were considered extremely dangerous.

Moody was convicted in April of two counts of capital murder and sentenced
to life without parole for killing Hattiesburg residents Robbie Bond, 21,
and William Hatcher, 27, in May 1995.

He was to stand trial Monday for a May 1995 stabbing death of Michael Lee,
31, of Mobile, Ala.

Perry County Sheriff Carlos Herring said Thomas had been held at the jail
for several months awaiting trial in a separate case involving his uncle's
slaying.

 

Back to index