48 Hours Mystery: The Writing on the Wall | CBS News

Produced by Sara Ely Hulse and Clare Friedland
[This show originally aired on May 5, 2012. It was updated on July 19, 2014.]

COLUMBIA, Ill. (CBS) - On the morning of May 5, 2009, Christopher Coleman returned home from the gym to a scene of chaos and unimaginable horror.


"I told him, 'Hey, they -- they didn't make it' -- being the family," Detective Justin Barlow of the Columbia Police Department said. "[Chris] sat down on the driveway and started sobbing. Said he felt like he was gonna throw up. And then kind of curled up in the fetal position."

Detective Barlow had been the Coleman's neighbor for five years and was the first to respond when Chris could not reach his wife.

"This crime scene, it wasn't bloody," he told "48 Hours" correspondent Maureen Maher. "...but that didn't mean it was less gruesome."

"Were you at all prepared for what you were about to walk into?" Maher asked.

"I don't think anybody could be prepared for that," said Barlow.

Upstairs, where they should have been safe in their beds, were 31-year-old Sheri and the couple's two young boys, 11-year-old Garett, and 9-year-old Gavin.

"What is the lasting image you have in your mind from that day?" Maher asked Barlow.

"I would say the one that sticks out the most would probably be Garett, just because he's the one that -- that, you know, I -- I discovered," he said.

"Is that a haunting image for you?"

"Yeah. Little bit," Barlow nodded.

The killer had not only taken Garett's life, but had desecrated the body by leaving another disturbing message.

"The spray paint in his room was actually on the sheet that was over his body?" asked Maher.

coelmanthreat.jpg
"Punished" One of the Manson-style messages spray-painted on a wall in the Coleman home CBS NEWS
"It was and there was some remnants of the spray paint on him as well," said Barlow.

"We knew that -- that this case was gonna be probably the biggest one -- of our lives -- definitely our careers, probably our lives," said Chief Joe Edwards.

Columbia, Ill., is a small, quiet suburb outside of St. Louis. Chief Edwards calls it "a wonderful place to live and raise a family."

Chief Edwards immediately recognized that his two investigators were going to need some help and called in a special unit - Major Jeff Connor and the Major Case Squad of Greater St. Louis, which brought in an army of 25 seasoned cops.

"It's typically your smaller departments that need the resource -- need the help," Maj. Connor explained.

Hours after the murders, the Major Case Squad swung into high gear. The CSI team started processing the house, warrants were secured to go through the Coleman's phones and computers, while a very distraught Chris was taken to the police station to give his statement.

Coleman told investigators that it had been a normal morning. He got up and left for the gym around 5:40 a.m. and called Sheri numerous times to wake her up.

As neighbors woke to the news of the murders, they were both devastated and terrified.

"So as I got down the street, I see that it was at the Coleman house. And I text her right away and said, 'Is everything OK?' And I didn't get a response," said an emotional Vanessa Riegerix.

Riegerix, who lived down the street, said the Colemans appeared to have a perfect life raising their two beautiful sons.

"I always thought of them as the American family, the perfect family," Riegerix said. "...everybody would want their children like these two boys, polite -- always helpful ... they had a heart of gold."


21 PHOTOS
The Coleman triple murder
The couple had been married for 12 years and met when they were both in the military, training at the K9 unit. Sheri became a stay-at-home mom.

Chris, 32, the son of a preacher, used his Marine and security experience to land a job for a well-known televangelist, Joyce Meyer.

"Joyce Meyer is now known throughout the country, and known throughout the world -- as a leading voice in the evangelical movement," St Louis Post-Dispatch reporter Nick Pistor explained. "She's extremely successful financially. ...I've seen figures from $50 million to $100 million a year."

Pistor has followed the Coleman case for two years and is a CBS News consultant.

"Joyce Meyer does conferences all throughout the world in countries that have -- that don't necessarily respond well -- to women who -- are preaching -- a Christian message. And so she wanted some deeper security," he said.

But being Joyce Meyer's head of security apparently put a target on Chris Coleman's back. In November 2008, Chris had begun receiving death threats to his work email.

"Whenever Chris Coleman reported the first death threat that he got from his e-mail account at w-- at his work at Joyce Meyer Ministries, he came to us at the police department," said Barlow.

The email read:

Tell Joyce to stop preaching the bull---- if I can't get to Joyce, then I will get to someone close to her
"We give the Coleman family... extra patrol which we just patrol the area a lot more than we normally would during a shift and give it special attention to make sure nobody's there," explained Barlow.

It was in January 2009, that a hand-delivered threat showed up in the mailbox at the Coleman family home. It read:

F--- You! Deny your God publically or else. No more oppurtunities [sic]. Time is running out for you and your family!
"Did it concern you as a neighbor living so closely when you heard that there were death treats being made to the guy who lived across the street?" Maher asked Barlow.

"Absolutely," he replied.

Each note seemed to escalate the seriousness of the situation and, on April 27, less than a week before the murders, a final missive arrived with an ultimatum:

Stop today or else. I know your schedule! You can't hide from me forever. I'm always watching. I know when you leave in the morning and I know when you stay home.
"You decided to ramp things up yourself to be proactive," Maher noted to Barlow. "And what did you do at your house?"

"We got one camera mounted up in my 5-year-old's bedroom and pointed it right at the mailbox," he replied.

With the camera aimed directly at the Coleman's mailbox, about 214 feet away approximately, according to Barlow, they hoped to get a clear shot of whoever was leaving the notes.

"...and be prepared for something that was gonna happen. And be as proactive about it as we could," said Barlow.

Instead, days later, the killer somehow snuck into the Coleman home and strangled Sheri, Garett and Gavin.

But if the murders were linked to the threats and Joyce Meyer Ministries, that meant the cops might now be on a global search for suspects.

"There was a lot of fear that there was somebody out there killin' families, and who was gonna be next?" said Maj. Connor.

QUESTIONING CHRIS COLEMAN
The small town of Columbia, Ill., was reeling with the sudden loss of Sheri, Garett and Gavin Coleman.

"This touched an entire community... The neighbors were shocked," reporter Nick Pistor explained. "They saw the young boys playing touch football with their father on the front lawn. These were little boys that they knew."

Close friends like Kathy LaPlante were crushed.

"You could just see the pain on everyone's face. It devastated the community," LaPlante said. "Sheri was a loving mother, loyal friend and sister to me. My life's not the same...it put hole in my heart."

"If I would've known for one millisecond she was in danger, I would've been down there," said Sheri's brother, Mario DiCiccio.

The Coleman Family
The Coleman Family THE COLEMAN FAMILY
For Sheri's brother and their mother, Angela, it was impossible to accept the reality of the brutal crime.

"She grew up to be a beautiful person on the outside as well as on the inside," Angela explained. "...they were her world, those boys. They were her world."

"Garett was more -- quiet and more like a -- more of a thinker. He was -- you could tell by lookin' in his eyes he was always thinking," Mario explained. "And Gavin was very...outgoing...he was like a social butterfly. ...his personality's just like his mom's. Just like his mother's."

"With Sheri, Garett and Gavin, I mean, I think that just... that's what the motivation was for everybody," said Det. Justin Barlow.

Hours into the investigation, the Major Case Squad continued to pursue their best lead -- finding whoever wrote those threats.

"We tracked down people across the country who didn't like Joyce Meyer. We interviewed them to find out where they were at on May the 4th and May the 5th," said Chief Joe Edwards.


And that morning they were hoping Chris Coleman might be able to point them in the right direction:

Det. Barlow: Who do you suspect? I mean. Out of all these emails and things you've been talking at work, there's got to be one person that stands out in your mind?
Chris Coleman: (voice cracks) I don't have a clue. I should have been there this morning.

But as police continued to talk to Coleman, they were surprised by how he was acting:

Sgt. Bivens: How do you think they died?
Chris Coleman: I have no idea. You guys haven't told me.

Sgt. Bivens: OK. Do you have any clues?

Chris Coleman: (Mumbles)

"Did he ever ask how his wife and children died? Maher asked Barlow.

"No," he replied.

"He never asked."

"No."

"What else sticks out in your mind from those first few hours?"

"Just the lack of reaction, I mean just the lack of curiosity of 'what's going on,'" said Barlow.

So police kept probing:

Sgt. Bivens: Was there a problem in your relationship? Was there anything currently that wasn't going so well in your relationship?
Chris Coleman: No, not really. I mean just a communication thing.

Sgt. Bivens: Had you seen anyone else outside of your wife.

Chris Coleman: What do you mean?

Sgt. Bivens: In a romantic way?

Chris Coleman: No.

Chris was adamant that he was not having a relationship outside of his marriage, so it seemed odd when he offered a stunning piece of information about another woman:

Chris Coleman: Tara in Florida that you guys are going to talk to, I talk to her a ton lately, but --
Sgt. Bivens: And what's with that?

Chris Coleman: Just a friend, somebody to talk to.

Tara is Tara Lintz -- a cocktail waitress and an old high school friend of Sheri's.

Sgt. Bivens: OK. You said you had a close friendship, but were you actually doing anything that you felt wouldn't be approved by your wife?
Chris Coleman: Some of the conversations, probably.

Coleman insisted they were just friends -- that he met Lintz through Sheri when their family went to Florida on vacation:

Sgt. Bivens: Did it have potential to go further?
Chris Coleman: No. I didn't want to do that to my kids.

Police in Lintz' hometown of St. Petersburg, Fla., were contacted to check out Chris' story.

Detective Shannon Halstead got the call.

"So, we went from the station to go make contact w ith her thinking it was gonna be a quick, 20-minute interview and it ended up being very different," she said.

That's because the information Halstead gained from Lintz about the relationship was very different than what Chris Coleman was telling police in Illinois.

"She provided the Blackberry and the laptop computer, obviously, had files of videos and emails ... relating to their relationship," Det. Halstead told Maher.

"Did you immediately step out and call St. Louis?"

"I did."

"And what did you say to them?"

"I said, 'I'm not positive, but I think this is his girlfriend,'" said Det. Halstead.

Armed with that information, Det. Barlow confronted Chris:

Det. Barlow: The one thing I did want to tell you right now, the St. Petersburg homicide unit is talking to Tara right now, and she showed us the pictures you sent her of you two, and we know you two have been having an affair.
"So was that a pretty big break for you guys?" Maher asked Det. Barlow.

"It was a -- important piece," he replied.

Investigators learned the couple had begun seeing each other in the fall of 2008, six months before the murders. During the affair, Chris would fly Lintz to meet him at locations where he was working for Joyce Meyer.

Det. Barlow: I know you guys went to Hawaii together. We pulled the Enterprise leasing cars receipt where you guys went to different trips together...
Chris Coleman: Well, I didn't think it was an affair.

Det. Barlow: You didn't think it was an affair?

Chris Coleman: No an affair is when you're like living with them and you plan to get married and everything.

"She had on her calendar -- a scheduled wedding to Chris Coleman, scheduled vacations, different accounts -- credit card accounts that they held together -- and I think she, honest to God, believed that he was going to leave his wife and two children," said Det. Halstead.

Chris' parents, Pastor Ron Coleman and his wife, Connie, were stunned to learn their son had an affair. They insisted it had nothing to do with the murders.

"He's always been a real gentle person-- kinda quiet," Connie Coleman told Maher.

"Is there any way there's a part of Chris that you don't know that could have been capable of this?" Maher asked.

"Not in my view," Ron Coleman replied. "... you couldn't put something around your kid's throat unless you're a monster. It's just not there. It's just not there."

While investigators believed Chris' affair with Tara Lintz was a strong motive for murder, there wasn't enough evidence to charge him. So after six long hours, Chris Coleman walked out a free man.

"It wasn't like we were wanting to believe that Chris is the one who did this. It's just that the evidence kept pointing to him," said Maj. Jeff Connor.

THE OTHER WOMAN
Every day, friends and neighbors are reminded of the beautiful lives that were stolen from them.

"The memorial -- in their subdivision is awesome. There's a bench and there's trees," Meegan Turnbeaugh explained. "...the community of Columbia Lakes got together and created that. ...So they wanted to do something positive. And they created a nice memorial."

Turnbeaugh says it's a fitting tribute - unlike the funeral service at Pastor Coleman's church.

"No friends, no family, no coaches. Nobody spoke about these three awesome people that were dead," she said.

In the days that followed the service, any sympathy for Chris Coleman was stripped away as news spread about his affair with Sheri's high school friend, Tara Lintz.

"Well, when the affair came out, and I had no idea, and I heard about it from someone else. I felt like every day I was just getting stabbed in the heart by these little pieces of information," said Kathy LaPlante.

Asked if she thought Coleman would be arrested, Turnbeaugh told Maher, "Yes. And I couldn't wait. I was nervous, to be honest with you."

The Major Case Squad felt that pressure.

"Obviously, in any case...you want to get the person responsible for it. But you want to get the right person," said Det. Justin Barlow.

But right away, there were red flags. Police were concerned when they found a basement window open and others unlocked.

"Here's a guy who's family is bein' threatened. They're gonna destroy his family while he's gone, and yet, that window was left unlocked, and it was obvious it was left unlocked, 'cause there was no forced entry," said Maj. Jeff Connor.

And remember that camera Det. Barlow installed in his house?

"We saw no strangers walking up and down the street. You saw no strange vehicles," said Chief Joe Edwards.

Chris had even installed his own surveillance cameras in his house.

"What about the surveillance equipment that was allegedly in the house?" Maher asked Maj. Connor.

"The recorder was missing," he replied.

"That's convenient."

"Yes."

An autopsy on Sheri revealed she fought violently with her killer, leaving her with two black eyes.

"Sheri was involved in an altercation before she was murdered. Those two boys weren't," said Chief Edwards.

Which made scratches found on Chris Coleman's arms all the more suspicious.

"When did you first notice the scratches on his arms?" Maher asked Det. Barlow.

"It was brought to my attention by people at the scene," he replied.

Det. Barlow: How are you doing?
Chris Coleman: Freezin.

Det. Barlow: Anything I can get you? You're freezing?

Police say Coleman tried to hide his arms during his interview.

"You can see on the video where he's asking for a blanket because he says he's cold. The only part of his body that he covers up are the -- you know, suspected-- marks on his arm," Barlow explained.

Det. Barlow: That'll work, won't it.
Chris Coleman: Yeah that's fine. As long as I can cover my arms. I'm freezing. [Covers his arms]

 48 HOURS SEGMENT EXTRAS
Chris Coleman police interview
"I remember in the interview room it being very warm in there," Barlow told Maher.

"Did you think he was in shock?"

"No."

Chris later claimed he got those scratches the day before when he was removing a satellite dish from his roof.

Asked if there was any DNA found at the scene that would implicate him, Det. Barlow said, "I'll just say there wasn't any DNA found that didn't belong there. No boogeyman, no -- unidentified DNA, anything like that."

There was incriminating evidence found on Chris' phone and computers, starting with X-rated snapshots and videos that Tara Lintz and Chris had sent each other.

"It was a serious affair. He had written down every -- her measurements, her favorite things. Everything about her he had stored so he could, you know -- buy her things or do whatever for her," reporter Nick Pistor said. "By November 5th of 2008, Chris had written on his computer that that was the day Tara changed his life."

For police, that date would set off alarms bells.

"And how many days after that, then, did the threats start to show up?" Maher asked Pistor.

"About nine days after that," he replied.

Nine days. The Colemans insist it's all a coincidence.

"It's my understanding that he had written down, 'November 5th, the day Tara changed my life.' That they had exchanged promise rings... And that he had even written down the name of their first child were it to be a little girl," Maher commented to Chris' parents. "Is that true?"

"That's not Chris," said Ron Coleman.

"Honestly, I cannot imagine him doin' that," Connie Coleman said. "He just didn't really operate in that -- in that arena of -- emotions. He just didn't. He was just very calm and logical sense."

Chris' parents believe their son is innocent and that it was an intruder who killed his family and left hateful messages. In fact, Chris even voluntarily provided samples of his own handwriting to police.

Asked what was the most important piece of evidence at the crime scene, Maj. Jeff Connor told Maher, "At the crime scene, probably the handwriting on the walls."

But those samples would later come back to haunt Chris Coleman.

"The crime scene lab coming back and saying that the handwriting found on the wall matches up to the handwriting -- from the handwriting example that Christopher Coleman gave at the Columbia Police Department," said Det. Barlow.

Finally, two weeks after the murders, police felt they had enough to make their case. Christopher Coleman was charged with the first-degree murder of his wife and two sons.

"If it was another time they would have had pitchforks and lanterns in their hands," Pistor said of the public's reaction. "They were out for vengeance. They wanted this case solved and they wanted it solved immediately and they wanted him to be found guilty immediately."

"Were you there when he was arrested?" Maher asked Ron Coleman.

"Yes. It was at night," he replied. "...the worst scenario. ... we'd lost Garett and Gavin and Sheri and now Chris is gone."

Sheri's friends and neighbors were relieved, but angry at the toll it had taken on them and their children.

"I've talked to some of the moms, and the children in the community wonder if their dad could do the same thing," said LaPlante.

And investigators insist all this pain was caused by Chris Coleman's obsession.

"And all because of a woman," Maher commented to Maj. Connor.

"I believe that had a major part of it," he said.

MOTIVE FOR MURDER?
"This crime was about greed, sex, selfishness, and narcissism. Chris Coleman decided he wanted a new life, and his family was in the way," Prosecutor Ed Parkinson told Maureen Maher. "He was obviously a monster who carried out a very sadistic plan."

By the time Chris Coleman went on trial in April 2011, prosecutor Ed Parkinson and his team had spent two years building their case.

"This was a huge case ... this was, like, a 10,000 piece puzzle," said Chief Joe Edwards.

The murders of Sheri Coleman and her two young boys were a big case for local media, as well. All the pre-trial publicity prompted the judge to bus in a jury from a county an hour-and-a-half away.

"What was the biggest challenge for you as a prosecutor in this case?" Maher asked Parkinson.

"People who turn out to be jurors have to accept the fact that parents kill their kids...it's just hard to accept," he replied. "He just looked like a good guy."

"How do you get that much hatred for a child?" Chief Edwards asked.

As unthinkable as it was, at every corner, investigators had turned up more evidence against Coleman. Some of it came from Sheri's own friends, who were determined to have their day in court.

"What was it like waiting for the two years for the trial?" Maher asked Meegan Turnbeaugh.

"It was life changing," she replied, "and not for the better."

"How did you feel about testifying?"

"I was scared to death. I was like, 'I'm gonna do this for Sheri.'"

Coleman, sporting a new hairdo and a bulletproof vest at his trial, would hear those friends bolster the prosecutor's claim that he had lied about his marriage in his interrogation:

Chris Coleman: We talked about it a while back about possibly maybe splitting up or something... We started meeting with actually one of the pastors...
Det. Justin Barlow: OK. From Joyce's church?

Chris Coleman: Yeah, things have been going awesome."

Coleman insisted that he and his wife had merely hit a few bumps in the road and were helped by counseling. Sheri told her friends a different story.

"She was in my room and she was crying and Chris wanted to leave her," Kathy LaPlante said. "And then he would start to say hurtful things like 'I never loved you.'"

But Sheri wasn't willing to let him go.

"And he would put on a face in front of the marriage counselor. And Sheri said when he got back home he'd yell at her and, you know, it would just be hell to pay," said LaPlante.

Prosecutor Parkinson says there's a reason Coleman wanted Sheri to be the one to divorce him.


21 PHOTOS
The Coleman triple murder
"I believe he became so enraptured by Tara Lintz...but he couldn't get divorced in his own mind, because then he'd lose his $100,000 job a year with Joyce Meyer Ministries," he said. "They frown on divorce, if it's your fault."

Parkinson believes Coleman was hoping to make a clean break before anyone caught on about the affair. In a videotaped deposition, Joyce Meyer confirmed her ministry's zero tolerance of adultery.

"If he would have been having an adulterous affair, while he was still married, then it could have definitely affected his job," said Meyer.

 48 HOURS SEGMENT EXTRAS
Joyce Meyer deposition excerpts
But eventually Sheri did find out her husband was having an affair with her best friend from high school.

"Sheri opened up her computer one night with a friend and said, 'Do you want to see the woman who's having an affair with my husband?' And showed images of Tara Lintz," said reporter Nick Pistor.

But Sheri still refused to get divorced. And something she said to her friend, Kathy LaPlante, will haunt her forever.

"When he came home, demanding a divorce...she told me that if anything happened to her, Chris did it," said LaPlante.

Several months later, Sheri and her sons were dead.

"What do you think the trigger was that made it May 5th?" Maher asked Parkinson.

"I think Tara was pressing him. I think he just got pushed into his own corner," the prosecutor replied.

"They had wedding dates planned. Chris had told Tara...that he was serving Sheri with divorce papers on May the 5th, the day of the homicides," Det. Justin Barlow told Maher.

"And had he ever filed divorce papers?"

"Not that we found, no," he replied.

"Did he ever speak to an attorney?"

"No."

After hearing all about this "other woman," the jury would finally get to meet her. It was the most anticipated moment of the trial: Tara Lintz making her entrance under police escort.

"She arrived at the courthouse ... almost like a Hollywood star arriving somewhere," Pistor recalled. "It was a packed courtroom gallery."

Lintz testified that she and Coleman talked or texted, "all the time, constantly" and that they often professed their love for each other. When asked whether she and Coleman had plans to marry, her short answer spoke volumes: "The divorce had to happen first."

"Do you think that Tara had anything to do with the murders?" Maher asked Parkinson.

"No, I don't," he replied.

"And you don't think she had any idea that something was about to happen?"

"Nope. Not from any of the evidence, I don't believe that," said Parkinson.

But the prosecutor does believe Coleman's lust for Tara Lintz had everything to do with it. And to drive his point home, he showed the court the sexually explicit videos and photos the two sent each other.

"We said, 'Lord please help us.' We don't have to look at this, but please help us sit here for his sake that he doesn't feel we're ashamed of him," Connie Coleman told Maher.

Now, instead of embarking on an exciting new life and keeping his six-figure income, Chris Coleman was facing the death penalty.

A GUT-WRENCHING CASE
Chris Coleman had a prominent local defense team at his side when he went on trial for his life. But John O'Gara and Bill Margulis had to admit they faced an uphill battle.

"The evidence was, although, all circumstantial, it was very overwhelming," said Margulis.

And at trial, one of the most critical pieces of evidence would be time of death. The prosecution maintains the three victims were killed hours before Coleman left the house to go to the gym.

"The bodies were stiff ... they had rigor mortis ... that everything pointed that they were dead by at least 3:00 in the morning," said reporter Nick Pistor.

"It could've been the whole case, quite frankly," said Prosecutor Ed Parkinson.

The defense insists that Sheri, Garett, and Gavin could have been killed that morning, during the hour and 10 minutes that Coleman was gone.

"You can use various formulas...the time of death is not an exact science," said Margulis.

As investigators kept building their case, something was troubling them about that trail of threatening letters and emails.

"It read: "If I can't get to Joyce then I will get to someone close to her," said Det. Justin Barlow.

"We didn't find anybody else who had received messages that were threatening to their family," said Chief Joe Edwards.

The prosecution's computer experts discovered there was good reason for that.

"Those threats were typed on his laptop," Parkinson told Maher.

"The email threats that came to him originated from..."

"...his own laptop," said Parkinson.

Those threats were sent from an account called destroychris@gmail.com. Defense attorney Bill Margulis insists someone else could have sent them.

"Anybody that had access to his computer, whether it was a co-worker or anybody else could've created that account," Margulis explained.

Investigators still had no so-called "smoking gun;" No DNA, no murder weapon and no eyewitness. But after analyzing the blood-red paint in those frightening messages on the walls, they believed they had something close to it.

"One can of that exact spray paint was purchased at a local hardware store. And the computerized signature said Christopher Coleman," said Edwards.

"You cannot paint that much without paint being somewhere on you," Ron Coleman said. "They literally cut him to the quick ... he pulled his own hair out for them ... there was not a trace of paint."

But if Coleman was the killer, it made a scene on the surveillance video -- recorded the afternoon before the bodies were discovered -- all the more chilling.

"It's a perfect suburban scene ... he played catch with his son at the house," Pistor said. "...and then, the next morning, they're dead. ...It's unexplainable."

Chris Coleman did not take the stand.

In a case that was gut-wrenching for everyone involved, it turns out, the jury was no exception.

"I didn't wanna believe that he could do that," said juror Gina West.

"I cried myself to sleep," juror Olivia Shopinski said. "Absolutely unimaginable. I mean, there's just so much hate. It's just hatred spread everywhere."

The first vote inside that jury room was 7 to 5, not guilty, but not because they believed Coleman was innocent.

"I mean, we all thought he did it. Who else would have done it?" said jury foreperson Jonece Pearman.

But many of the jurors were troubled by the circumstantial nature of the case.

"You wanted factual, tangible evidence that said he did it?" Maher asked.

"Make 'em prove it," said West.

As the deliberations entered a second day, crowds gathered outside the courthouse, the tension mounting. Sheri's mother remained optimistic.

"We will get justice for my daughter and my grandsons," Angela DiCiccio told reporters outside the courthouse. "I have what they call the mother instinct. I am very confident."

Incredibly, it was the jurors own detective work that, they say, pushed them over the top. When they looked at the back of a picture of Chris Coleman and Tara Lintz kissing, they noticed it was taken on Oct. 21, 2008.

"I think actually what I said was, 'Oh my God.' And I said, 'What was the date that he said the affair started?'" Pearman recalled.

"Yeah, the dates didn't match," West affirmed.

"Which wasn't til November -- and the picture was created in October," Pearman continued. "October, way before they said they had been seeing each other."

"And what did that say to you?" Maher asked Pearman.

"That was something black and white in front of my face that said if he could lie about this, he's lying about everything," she said.

After 15 hours of deliberations, the verdict was guilty. The crowd outside the courthouse erupted in applause and cheers.

"I had never seen anything like what happened on the lawn of the courthouse that night," said Pistor.

The verdict was handed down on May 5, 2011, two years to the day that Sheri, Garett, and Gavin were found murdered.

"I walked outta the courtroom and the first words out of my mouth, 'Yes, we did it, we got justice," Angela DiCiccio said.

The judge sentenced Coleman to life in prison, in part, because the State of Illinois' repeal of the death penalty was just months away from taking effect.


"48 Hours" spoke to Chris Coleman by phone, because cameras were not allowed inside the prison:

Maureen Maher: Did you kill your wife and your children?
Chris Coleman: No, absolutely not. I absolutely love my wife and my kids. And this, you know, it's not, it's not me.

Maureen Maher: How do you love your wife and be having an affair with one of her best friends?

Chris Coleman: Well...just because maybe I wasn't, you know, selfishly getting what I thought I...should be getting at home...from the physical side of things. But I still absolutely loved her.

Coleman denies he was planning to divorce Sheri to marry his mistress, Tara Lintz:

 48 HOURS SEGMENT EXTRAS
Coleman phone call with Maureen Maher
Maureen Maher: So why does Tara say that?
Chris Coleman: It was discussed on several different things...and you know, it was a conversation...but there was no specific plans or no dates...or nobody asking each other to be married or anything like that.

Maureen Maher: She also says that you told her that you were...serving divorce papers to Sheri.

Chris Coleman: You know, unfortunately, and I feel horrible about it... if I ever talk to Tara again, that would be something that I apologize to her about...that was a lie. ...I lied to Tara about that.

So if he didn't murder his family, who did?

Chris Coleman: I have absolutely no clue. Believe me, I have wracked my brain for two-and-a-half years trying to figure that part out. ...I just had to stop and give it to God, just release that and do my best to forgive that person and move on.

Forgiving and moving on has been difficult for Sheri's friends, who are still struggling to understand this incomprehensible crime.

"As a Christian, I feel like it's imperative that I forgive, because Jesus forgave me. And I want to forgive with all my heart," Kathy LaPlante said, choking up.

"What makes it so hard to do that?" Maher asked.

"Because they were so innocent," she said.

Sheri's family and friends want to ensure that she, Garett and Gavin are never forgotten. They've been raising money to help victims of domestic violence. And they hope to build a new Little League field and name it after those two young boys who loved to play ball.

"The boys had their whole life ahead of them...they didn't deserve it," Vanessa Riegerix said. "This should've never happened. Shoulda never happened."

After a long legal battle with the Colemans, Sheri's family was allowed to rebury Sheri and her sons in a cemetery closer to their home in Chicago.

Chris Coleman is appealing his conviction.

Serial Killers Joe Ball The Butcher Of Elmendorf Documentary

Serial Killers Joe Ball The Butcher Of Elmendorf Documentary

Joseph D. (Joe) Ball (January 7, 1896[2] – September 24, 1938)[1] was an American serial killer, sometimes referred to as "The Alligator Man",[3] the "Butcher of Elmendorf"[4] and the "Bluebeard[3] of South Texas". He is known to have killed two and is said to have killed as many as 20 women in the 1930s. His existence was long believed to be apocryphal, but he is a familiar figure in Texas folklore.

Background[edit]

After serving on the front lines in Europe during World War I, Ball started his career as a bootlegger, providing illegal liquor to those who could pay. After the end of Prohibition, he opened a saloon called the Sociable Inn in Elmendorf, Texas. He built a pond that contained six alligators because he misunderstood the term corpus delicti, believing that a murder conviction without a body would be impossible.[citation needed] He charged people to view them, especially during feeding time; the food consisted mostly of live cats and dogs.[4]

Murders[edit]

After a while, women in the area were reported missing, including barmaids, former girlfriends and his wife. When two Bexar County sheriff's deputies went to question him in 1938, Ball pulled a handgun from his cash register and killed himself[3] with a bullet through the heart (some sources report that he shot himself in the head).

A handyman who conspired with Ball, Clifford Wheeler, admitted to helping Ball dispose of the bodies of two of the women he had killed.[3] Wheeler led them to the remains of Hazel Brown and Minnie Gotthard. Wheeler told authorities that Ball murdered at least 20 other women, but the alligators had disposed of any evidence. There has never been any concrete evidence that the alligators actually ate any of his victims.

There were few written sources from the era which could verify Ball's crimes. Newspaper editor Michael Hall investigated the story in depth in 2002, and wrote on his findings for Texas Monthly.[4]

Source: wikipedia

Serial Killers Johann Unterweger The Vienna Strangler Documentary

Serial Killers Johann Unterweger The Vienna Strangler Documentary

Johann "Jack" Unterweger (16 August 1950 – 29 June 1994) was an Austrian serial killer who murdered prostitutes in several countries. First convicted of a 1974 murder, he was released in 1990 as an example of rehabilitation. He became a journalist and minor celebrity, but within months started killing again. He committed suicide following a conviction for several murders. Austrian psychiatrist Dr. Reinhard Haller diagnosed him with narcissistic personality disorder in 1994.[1]

Early life[edit]

Unterweger was born in 1950 to Theresia Unterweger, a Viennese barmaid and waitress, and an unknown American soldier whom she met in Trieste.[2] Some sources describe his mother as a prostitute.[3] His mother was jailed for fraud while pregnant but was released and travelled to Graz where he was born. In 1953, his mother was again arrested and he was sent to Carinthia in southern Austria to live with his grandfather, whom he described as a violent alcoholic.[citation needed]

He was in and out of prison during his youth for petty crimes, and for assaulting a local prostitute. Between 1966 and 1975 he was convicted 16 times, mostly for sexual assault and spent most of those nine years in jail.[4] In 1974, Unterweger murdered 18-year-old German Margaret Schäfer by strangling her with her own bra, and in 1976 was arrested and sentenced to life in prison with no parole option for 15 years. While in prison, Unterweger became an author of short stories, poems, plays, and an autobiography, Fegefeuer oder die Reise ins Zuchthaus (Purgatory or the trip to prison), which was adapted into a motion picture.

In 1985, a campaign to pardon and release Unterweger from prison was undertaken. President Rudolf Kirchschläger refused the petition when presented to him, stating that Unterweger must spend the court-mandated minimum of 15 years in prison.[2] The campaign gathered momentum among the Viennese cafe intellectuals,[5] Vienna’s radical-chic set, writers, artists, journalists and politicians who agitated for a pardon,[6] including the author and 2004 Nobel Prize winner Elfriede Jelinek, Günter Grass,[5] Peter Huemer[7] and the editor of the magazine Manuskripte, Alfred Kolleritsch.[6] He was released on 23 May 1990, after the required minimum 15 years of his life term. Upon his release, Unterweger's autobiography Fegefeuer oder die Reise ins Zuchthaus was taught in schools and his stories for children were performed on the radio. Unterweger himself hosted television programs which discussed criminal rehabilitation, and he reported as a journalist for the state broadcaster ORF (Austria's equivalent of the BBC), including reporting stories concerning the very murders for which he was later found guilty.[5][6]

Murders[edit]

Law enforcement later found that Unterweger killed prostitute in Czechoslovakia[8] and six more in Austria in 1990, the first year after his release. In 1991, Unterweger was hired by an Austrian magazine to write about crime in Los Angeles, California, and the differences between U.S. and European attitudes to prostitution. Unterweger met with local police, even going so far as to participate in a ride-along of the city's red light districts. During Unterweger's time in Los Angeles, three prostitutes — Shannon Exley, Irene Rodriguez, and Sherri Ann Long — were beaten, sexually assaulted with tree branches, and strangled with their own brassieres.

In Austria, Unterweger was suggested as a suspect for the prostitute murders. In the absence of other suspects, the police took a serious look at Unterweger and kept him under surveillance until he went to the U.S. — ostensibly as a reporter — observing nothing to connect him with the murders.

Arrest[edit]

Law enforcement eventually had enough evidence for his arrest, but Unterweger was gone by the time they entered his home. After law enforcement chased him through Europe, Canada and the U.S., he was finally arrested by the FBI in Miami, Florida, on 27 February 1992. While a fugitive, he had called the Austrian media to try to convince them of his innocence. Back in Austria, Unterweger was charged with 11 homicides, one of which had occurred in Prague.

That night, he committed suicide at Graz-Karlau Prison by hanging himself with a rope made from shoelaces and a cord from the trousers of a track suit.[9] He is reported to have used an intricate knot identical to that used on the murdered prostitutes. Because he died before he could appeal the verdict, under a technicality of Austrian law, Unterweger is officially to be considered as innocent, despite the original guilty verdict; Unterweger's case was one of those considered in a review of this Austrian legal principle.

Dramatizations[edit]

In a 2008 performance, actor John Malkovich portrayed Unterweger's life in a performance for one actor, two sopranos, and period orchestra entitled Seduction and Despair, which premiered at Barnum Hall in Santa Monica, CA.[10] A fully staged version of the production, entitled The Infernal Comedy premiered in Vienna in July 2009. The show has since been performed throughout Europe, North America and South America.[11] In 2015 Elisabeth Scharang directed a film called Jack about Unterweger.[12]

Television[edit]

The story of the police investigation, pursuit and prosecution of Unterweger is the subject of an episode of The FBI Files entitled "Killer Abroad" (Season 2, Episode 14). He is also the subject of an episode of Biography entitled "Poet of Death."

Source: wikipedia

Serial Killers John Edward Robinson The Slave Master Documentary

John Edward Robinson (born December 27, 1943) is a convicted serial killer, con man, embezzler, kidnapper, and forger who was found guilty in 2003 of three murders and received the death sentence for two of them. He subsequently admitted responsibility for five additional homicides, and investigators fear that there might be other, undiscovered victims as well.[1]

Because he made contact with most of his post-1993 victims via on-line chat rooms, he is sometimes referred to as "the Internet's first serial killer".[2]

Early life

Robinson was born in Cicero, Illinois, the third of five children of an alcoholic father and a disciplinarian mother.[2]:4 In 1957 he became an Eagle Scout, and reportedly traveled to London with a group of Scouts who performed before Queen Elizabeth II. Later that year he enrolled at Quigley Preparatory Seminary in Chicago, a private boys' school for aspiring priests, but dropped out after one year due to disciplinary issues.[3]

In 1961 he enrolled at Morton Junior College in Cicero to become a medical X-ray technician, but dropped out after two years. In 1964 he moved to Kansas City and married Nancy Jo Lynch, who bore their first child, John Jr., in 1965, followed by a daughter, Kimberly, in 1967, and twins Christopher and Christine in 1971.

Early crimes

Robinson was arrested for the first time in Kansas City in 1969, after embezzling $33,000 from the medical practice of Dr. Wallace Graham, where he worked as an X-ray technician, a job he obtained using forged credentials. He was sentenced to three years' probation.[3]

In 1970 Robinson violated probation by moving back to Chicago without his probation officer's permission, and took a job as an insurance salesman at the R.B. Jones Company. In 1971 he was arrested once again for embezzling firm funds and ordered back to Kansas City, where his probation was extended. In 1975 it was extended again after another arrest, this time on charges of securities fraud and mail fraud in connection with a phony "medical consulting" company he had formed in Kansas City.

During this period, Robinson cultivated and maintained the outward appearance of a community-minded citizen and family man; he became a Scoutmaster, a baseball coach and a Sunday school teacher. In 1977 he talked his way onto the board of directors of a local charitable organization and forged a series of letters from its executive director to the mayor of Kansas City, and from the mayor to other civic leaders, commending his generous volunteer efforts and generally singing his praises. Eventually he had himself named the organization's Man of the Year, and threw a festive awards luncheon in his own honor.[3]

In 1979 Robinson finally completed probation; but in 1980 he was arrested again on multiple charges, including embezzlement and check forgery, for which he served 60 days in jail in 1982. After his release he formed a bogus hydroponics business and swindled $25,000 from a friend whom he promised a fast investment return to pay for his dying wife's health care.[2]:4 At this time he reportedly began sexually propositioning his neighbors’ wives, triggering a fistfight with one of the husbands. He also claimed to have joined a secret sadomasochism cult called the International Council of Masters, and to have become its “Slavemaster”, whose duties included luring victims to gatherings to be tortured and raped by cult members.[3]

Murders begin[edit]

In 1984, having started two more fraudulent shell companies (Equi-Plus and Equi-2), Robinson hired Paula Godfrey, 19, ostensibly to work as a sales representative. Godfrey told friends and family that Robinson was sending her away for training. After hearing nothing further from her, Godfrey's parents filed a missing persons report. Police questioned Robinson, who denied any knowledge of her whereabouts. Several days later her parents received a typewritten letter, with Godfrey's signature at the bottom, thanking Robinson for his help and asserting that she was "OK" and did not want to see her family. The investigation was terminated, as Godfrey was of legal age and there was no evidence of wrongdoing. No trace of Paula Godfrey has ever been found.[2]

In 1985, using the name John Osborne, he met Lisa Stasi and her four-month-old daughter, Tiffany, at a battered women’s shelter in Kansas City. He promised Lisa a job in Chicago, an apartment, and daycare for her baby, and asked her to sign several sheets of blank stationery. A few days later Robinson contacted his brother and sister-in-law, who had been unable to adopt a baby through traditional channels, and informed them that he knew of a baby whose mother had committed suicide. For $5,500 in "legal fees", Don and Helen Robinson received Tiffany Stasi (whose identity was confirmed by DNA testing in 2000[4]) and a set of authentic-appearing adoption papers with the forged signatures of two lawyers and a judge. Lisa Stasi was never heard from again.[2]:4

In 1987 Catherine Clampitt, 27, left her child with her parents in Wichita Falls, Texas and moved to Kansas City to find employment. She was hired by Robinson, who reportedly promised her extensive travel and a new wardrobe. She vanished in June of that year. Her missing persons case remains open.[4]

From 1987 to 1993 Robinson was incarcerated, first in Kansas (1987–91) on multiple fraud convictions and thereafter in Missouri for another fraud conviction and parole violations. At Western Missouri Correctional Facility he met 49-year-old Beverly Bonner, the prison librarian, who upon his release left her husband and moved to Kansas to work for him. After Robinson arranged for Bonner's alimony checks to be forwarded to a Kansas post office box, her family never heard from her again. For several years Bonner's mother continued forwarding her alimony checks, and Robinson continued cashing them.[3]

By now Robinson had discovered the Internet and roamed various social networking sites using the name "Slavemaster", looking for women who enjoyed playing the submissive partner role during sex. The first victim he met online was Sheila Faith, 45, whose 15-year-old daughter Debbie was wheelchair-bound due to spina bifida. He portrayed himself as a wealthy man who would support them, pay for Debbie's therapy, and give Sheila a job. In 1994 the mother and daughter moved from Fullerton, California to Kansas City and immediately disappeared. Robinson cashed Faith's pension checks for the next seven years.[2]:6

Gradually, Robinson became well known in the increasingly popular BDSM online chat rooms. In 1999 he offered a job and a bondage relationship to Izabela Lewicka, a 21-year-old Polish immigrant living in Indiana. When she moved to Kansas City, the still-married Robinson gave her an engagement ring and brought her to the county registrar where they paid for a marriage license that was never picked up. It is unclear whether Lewicka believed she and Robinson were married; she told her parents she had married, but never told them her husband's name. She did sign a 115-item slave contract that gave Robinson almost total control over every aspect of her life, including her bank accounts. Sometime during the summer of 1999 she disappeared. Robinson told a Web designer he employed that she had been caught smoking marijuana and deported.[2]:8

Around the time of Lewicka's disappearance Robinson convinced Suzette Trouten, a lonely licensed practical nurse, to move from Michigan to Kansas so they could travel the world together while she became his submissive sex slave. Trouten's mother received several typed letters, purportedly mailed while the couple was abroad, although the envelopes were stamped with Kansas City postmarks. The letters were, her mother said, uncharacteristically mistake-free. Later, Robinson told Trouten's mother that she had run off with an acquaintance after stealing money from him.[2]:9

Arrest

Robinson became increasingly careless over time and did a progressively poorer job of covering his tracks. By 1999 he had attracted the attention of authorities in both Kansas and Missouri as his name cropped up in more and more missing persons investigations.

Robinson was arrested in June 2000 at his farm near La Cygne, Kansas after a woman filed a sexual battery complaint against him and another charged him with stealing her sex toys.[1] The theft charge, in particular, finally gave investigators the probable cause they needed to obtain search warrants. On the farm a task force found the decaying bodies of two women, later identified as Izabela Lewicka and Suzette Trouten, in two 85-pound chemical drums.[2]:9

Across the state line in Missouri, other members of the task force, searching a storage facility where Robinson rented two garages, found three similar chemical drums containing corpses subsequently identified as Beverly Bonner, Sheila Faith, and her daughter Debbie Faith. All five women were killed in the same way, by one or more blows to the head with a hammer or other blunt instrument.[2]:9

Conviction

In 2002 Robinson stood trial in Kansas for the murders of Suzette Trouten, Isabella Lewicka and Lisa Stasi, along with multiple lesser charges. After his conviction on all counts, he received the death sentence for the murders of Trouten and Lewicka, and life imprisonment for Stasi's (because she was killed before Kansas reinstated the death penalty). He also received a five-to-20-year prison sentence for "interfering with the parental custody" of Stasi's baby, 20½ years for kidnapping Trouten, and seven months for theft.[2]:9

After his Kansas convictions Robinson faced additional murder charges in Missouri, based on the evidence discovered in that state. Missouri is far more aggressive in its pursuit of capital punishment convictions, and Robinson's attorneys were anxious to avoid a trial there. (Kansas has not executed anyone since reinstating its death penalty statute in 1986.) Chris Koster, the Missouri prosecutor, insisted as a condition of any plea bargain that Robinson lead authorities to the bodies of Lisa Stasi, Paula Godfrey and Catherine Clampitt. Robinson, who has never cooperated in any way with investigators, refused; but Koster still faced pressure to make a deal because his case was not technically airtight. (Among other issues, there was no unequivocal evidence that any of the murders had actually been committed within his jurisdiction.) Robinson, on the other hand, faced pressure to plead guilty to avoid an almost certain death sentence in Missouri, and failing that, yet another capital murder trial back in Kansas.

When it became clear that the women's remains would never be found without Robinson's cooperation, a compromise of sorts was reached: In a carefully scripted plea in October, 2003, Robinson acknowledged only that Koster had enough evidence to convict him of capital murder for the deaths of Godfrey, Clampitt, Bonner and the Faiths. Though his statement was technically a guilty plea, and was accepted as such by the Missouri court, observers remarked that it was notably devoid of any contrition, or specific acceptance of responsibility.[2]:15 He received a life sentence without possibility of parole for each of the five murders.[5]

Robinson currently remains on death row at the El Dorado Correctional Facility in Kansas, and could become the first convict executed by lethal injection in that state.

Aftermath

In 2005 Nancy Robinson filed for divorce after 41 years of marriage, citing incompatibility and irreconcilable differences.[5]

In 2006 Lisa Stasi's daughter—known since her "adoption" as Heather Robinson—filed a civil suit against Truman Medical Center in Kansas City and social worker Karen Gaddis. The suit accused Gaddis of putting John Robinson in contact with Stasi and her newborn daughter in 1984, after he told Gaddis that he ran a charitable organization providing assistance to "unwed mothers of white babies." In 2007 Heather Robinson and the hospital reached a settlement for an undisclosed sum, which Robinson said she would split with her biological grandmother, Patricia Sylvester.[5] Heather Robinson won a second judgment, in 2007, preventing John Robinson from profiting from any future potential book sales or film rights.[6]

In 2006 the body of a young woman was found in a barrel in an area of rural Iowa where Robinson reportedly had a business partner. The identity of the victim—whose remains, forensics experts say, could have been in the barrel for 20 years or more—and Robinson's possible involvement, remain open questions.[7] Kansas and Missouri police note that long stretches of Robinson's time remain unaccounted for, and they fear that there are additional undiscovered victims. "He's maintained the secrets about what he's done with the women, he won't ever tell, it's the last control that he's got," said one investigator. "There are [probably] other barrels waiting to be opened, other bodies waiting to be found."[1]

Victims

Robinson is known to be responsible for eight homicides, but his total victim tally remains unknown. The following is a chronological summary of the eight victims identified thus far:

1984: Paula Godfrey (age 19); remains never recovered

1985: Lisa Stasi (19); remains never recovered

1987: Catherine Clampitt (27); remains never recovered

1993: Beverly Bonner (49): remains discovered at storage facility in Raymore, Missouri

1994: Sheila Faith (45) and Debbie Faith (15): remains of both discovered at storage facility in Raymore, Missouri

1999: Izabela Lewicka (21): remains discovered at Robinson's ranch near La Cygne, Kansas

2000: Suzette Trouten (28): remains discovered at Robinson's ranch near La Cygne, Kansas

Serial Killer Alexander Pichushkin Russias Worst Serial Killer Documentary

Serial Killer Alexander Pichushkin Russian Worst Serial Killer Documentary

Alexander Yuryevich "Sasha" Pichushkin (Russian: Алекса́ндр Ю́рьевич Пичу́шкин, born 9 April 1974), also known as The Chessboard Killer and The Bitsa Park Maniac, is a Russian serial killer. He is believed to have killed at least 49 people, and possibly as many as 60, in southwest Moscow's Bitsa Park, where a number of the victims' bodies were found.

.

Early life

Pichushkin is remembered to have been an initially sociable child. However, this changed following an incident in which Pichushkin fell backwards off a swing and was then struck in the forehead as it swung back. Experts have speculated that this event damaged the frontal cortex of Pichushkin's brain; such damage is known to produce poor impulse regulation and a tendency towards aggression. That this event happened when Pichushkin was still a child is also significant, as a child's forehead provides only 1/8 the protection for the brain of an adult's. Indeed, following this accident Pichushkin frequently became hostile and impulsive, and his mother decided to transfer him from a mainstream school to one for children with learning disabilities. Following this transfer, children from the mainstream school began to physically and verbally bully Pichushkin, referring to him as "that retard". This abuse served to intensify Pichushkin's rage and hostility. Upon his reaching early adolescence, Pichushkin's maternal grandfather recognized that Pichushkin was highly intelligent, and felt that his innate talents were being wasted, as he wasn't involved in any activities at home, and the school he was enrolled in focused more on overcoming disability than on promoting achievement.

The grandfather took Pichushkin to live in his home and encouraged him to pursue intellectual pursuits outside of school. The deepest of these interests was chess, with Pichushkin being taught how to play and, after demonstrating his ability, being introduced to the exhibition games played publicly in Bitsa Park. It turned out that Pichushkin was an outstanding chess player, and in these games against generally elderly men, Pichushkin first found a channel for his aggression by dominating the chessboard in all of his games. Unfortunately, Pichushkin was still bullied by mainstream school children throughout his adolescence and, as perhaps the cruelest emotional blow, toward the end of this period Pichushkin's grandfather died. Pichushkin was left to return to his mother's home, at which time he enrolled as a student. The death of his grandfather reportedly greatly affected Pichushkin, and, possibly in an effort to dull the pain of the loss and to calm his severe aggressive tendencies, he began to consume large quantities of vodka. He continued to play chess both at home and in the exhibition games in Bitsa Park, now joining the other men in drinking vodka, though unlike them he could play without being greatly affected by the alcohol. It was at this time that Pichushkin began to develop a more sinister hobby that at the time remained unknown to anyone: whenever he knew he was going to come into contact with children, he would take a video camera along and proceed to threaten them. On one disturbing, and alarmingly prophetic, occasion that has since been made public, he held a young child by one leg, upside down, and said to the camera: "You are in my power now... I am going to drop you from the window... and you will fall 15 meters to your death..." He then watched these videos repeatedly to reaffirm his power. However, by 1992, this practice had become insufficient to satisfy his urges.[citation needed]

Murders

Pichushkin committed his first known murder as a student in 1992 and stepped up his crimes in 2001.[1] Russian media have speculated that Pichushkin was motivated, in part, by a macabre competition with another notorious Russian serial killer, Andrei Chikatilo, the 'Rostov Ripper', who was convicted in 1992 of killing 53 children and young women over a 12 year period.[2] Pichushkin has said his aim was to kill 64 people, the number of squares on a chessboard.[3][4] He later recanted this statement, saying that he would have continued killing indefinitely if he had not been stopped.[5]

Pichushkin targeted primarily elderly homeless men by luring them with the offer of free vodka. After drinking with them, he would kill them with repeated blows to the head with a hammer. In what became his trademark, or signature, he would then push a vodka bottle into the gaping wound in their skulls. He also targeted younger men, children and women. He would always attack from behind in order to take the victim by surprise and to avoid spilling blood on his clothes.[6] He claimed that while killing people he felt like God as he decided whether his victims should live or die. "In all cases I killed for only one reason. I killed in order to live, because when you kill, you want to live," he once said. "For me, life without murder is like life without food for you. I felt like the father of all these people, since it was I who opened the door for them to another world."[7] Experts at the Serbsky Institute, Russia's main psychiatric clinic, have found Pichushkin sane, but suffering from antisocial personality disorder and narcissistic personality disorder, making him a psychopath.

According to the documentary, "Serial Killers",[8] Pichushkin, once apprehended, led police officers to the scenes of many of his crimes in Bitsa Park, and demonstrated a keen recollection of how the murders were committed. He was filmed reenacting them in great detail, a process which is a regular part of Russian criminal investigation. He also revealed that some of the murders he committed were not done in his preferred method (hammer blows to the back of the head), but by throwing his victims down into the network of sewers running underneath Bitsa Park (although one of his victims did survive this ordeal).

The murder of Marina Moskalyova, 36, in the spring of 2006, was his last. When her body was found in Bitsa Park, complete with Pichushkin's trademark injuries, a metro ticket found in her possession led authorities to review surveillance tape footage from the Moscow metro system, where she was filmed, just hours before her death, walking on the platform accompanied by Pichushkin.[9]

Trial and imprisonment

He was arrested on 16 June 2006, and convicted on 24 October 2007 of 49 murders and 3 attempted murders.[10] He asked a Russian court to add an additional 11 victims to his body count, bringing his claimed death toll to 60, and 3 surviving victims.[11] During his trial, as with Andrei Chikatilo, Pichushkin was housed in a glass cage for his own protection.[12] It took Judge Vladimir Usov an hour to read the verdict: life in prison with the first 15 years to be spent in solitary confinement.[10]

Serial Killer Paul Durousseau The Jacksonville Serial Killer Documentary

Serial Killer Paul Durousseau The Jacksonville Serial Killer Documentary

Paul Durousseau (born August 11, 1970) is a serial killer from the United States who murdered seven young women (including two who were pregnant) in the southeast United States between 1997 and 2003. German authorities suspect he may have killed several local women when he was stationed there with the Army during the early 1990s. Typically, Durousseau would gain the victim’s trust, enter the victim’s home, tie their hands, rape, then strangle them to death.[2] All of his known victims were young, single African-American women.

Personal life

Paul Durousseau was born in Beaumont, Texas. Little is known publicly about Paul Durousseau's childhood. His first offenses with the law as an adult took place on December 18, 1991 and on January 21, 1992 for carrying a concealed firearm in California.[3] In November 1992, he enlisted in the US Army[3] and was stationed in Germany, where he met Natoca, who would later become his wife.

The two married in 1995 in Las Vegas. In 1996, they were transferred to Fort Benning, Georgia. On March 13, 1997, he was arrested for kidnapping and raping a young woman. However, in August of that year he was cleared of those charges. Soon after, he was found in possession of stolen goods. He was court-martialed in January 1999, found guilty and dishonorably discharged from the Army.[4]:3

The two moved to Durousseau's hometown of Jacksonville, Florida where they had two daughters. It was during that period that he committed most of the murders. He struggled to keep jobs and make ends meet, and the couple would often have fights over the issue of finances. In 1999, the police advised Durousseau's wife on how to file for a restraining order after he allegedly slapped her in the face and grabbed her by the neck. Later, she testified he got violently angry when she talked about getting a divorce. In September and October 2001, Durousseau spent 48 days in jail for domestic battery.[4]

Durousseau still managed to hold various legitimate jobs. In 2001, he was hired as a school bus driver and an animal control worker despite being a convicted felon. In 2003, he worked as a taxi driver in Jacksonville. It was erroneously reported that Gator City Taxi Company failed to run a background check on Durousseau[5] and it is now accepted that this is how he first came into contact with some of his victims. The City Of Jacksonville Department of Motor Vehicle/Taxicab Inspection office is responsible for background investigations of all persons applying for taxicab driver permits. Durousseau was issued a Taxicab Driver Permit from the City of Jacksonville.[6]

Neighbors and friends described him as a "lewd womanizer". He often asked young women when they planned to "make flicks" with him. A witness recalled Durousseau hitting on a girl that appeared to be 13 or 14 years old.[7]

Chronology of the murders

Less than one month after the acquittal over the rape charges, the nude body of 26-year-old Tracy Habersham was found on September 7, 1997 in Fort Benning.[8] She had been missing for 48 hours and was last seen leaving a party. She had been raped and strangled to death with a cord. Paul Durousseau was not a suspect in the murder but DNA would later tie him to the crime. He also would confess in Habersham's killing after his arrest.[3][9]

In 1999, he raped and killed 24-year-old Tyresa Mack in her apartment. Witnesses saw him leave her place with a television.[10] In 2001, he was arrested for raping a young woman in Jacksonville. He spent 30 days in jail and received two years' probation. On December 19, 2002, 18-year-old Nicole L. Williams' body was found wrapped in a blue blanket at the bottom of a ditch in Jacksonville. She had been reported missing two days earlier.[8]

On January 1, 2003, family members of 19-year-old Nikia Kilpatrick went to check on her. They had not had any news from her for several days. They found her body in the bedroom of her apartment. She had been raped then killed by strangulation with a cord two days before. Her two sons, an eleven-month-old and a two-year-old, were alive but malnourished. Kilpatrick was approximately six months pregnant at the time of her death.[4]

On January 9 of the same year, 20-year-old nurse assistant Shawanda Denise McCalister, who was also pregnant at the time of her death, was raped and strangled to death in her Jacksonville apartment. The murder scene was almost identical to that of Nikia Kilpatrick. She was killed on Durousseau's first day of driving a cab for Gator City Taxi. Her body was found the following day.

The next two victims were 17-year-old Jovanna Jefferson, and 19-year-old Surita Cohen. Their bodies were found close to each other in a ditch next to a construction site on New Kings Road in Jacksonville on February 5. Police estimated that Jefferson was murdered around January 20 and Cohen was killed 10 days later. Witnesses recount having seen the two last victims with a taxi driver fitting Paul Durousseau's description on the night they disappeared.

He was arrested and charged with five counts of murder on June 17, 2003. On December 13, 2007 he was sentenced to die by lethal injection for the murder of Tyresa Mack. As of August 18, 2013, he was still a resident on Florida's death row at Union Correctional Institution. No execution date has been set.

Serial Killer Morris Solomon Jr The Sacramento Slayer Documentary

Serial Killer Morris Solomon Jr The Sacramento Slayer Documentary

Morris Solomon Jr. (born March 15, 1944[1]) is a convicted serial killer now sitting on death row in San Quentin, California

Early life

Relatives and friends described Solomon's upbringing in rural Georgia as abusive. He was raised primarily by his grandmother, Bertha, who beat him and his brother daily for infractions such as bedwetting, mispronouncing words, or crying during a beating. Sometimes, she hit them for no apparent reason. When Solomon was very young, Bertha beat him by laying him over her lap and hitting him repeatedly. She also made him remove all his clothing and stand on a stool in the corner, where she beat his bare body, including his genitalia, with an electrical cord or switches she made him bring to her. Bertha sometimes beat him until he bled. Once, she tied his hands around the pole of a bed with an extension cord to keep him from backing away from her during a beating.[2][3]

Solomon had little contact with his parents for the first 13 years of his life. He was reunited with them when Bertha and the family moved to Isleton, a small farming town 40 miles south of Sacramento. They were among a handful of black families living in a poor, rundown section of the town known as “Cannery Row” or “Tinpan Alley.” His parents frequently beat and sexually assaulted one another in front of him. His mother and grandmother often beat him and verbally abused him in public. Friends and relatives would later describe his mother as a “loose woman” who regularly “entertained” different men.[2]

After high school, he attended community college and worked at various jobs, including carpentry, car repair, and bus driving.

He served in Vietnam for one year starting in the summer of 1966.[3] He returned to Isleton after his tour of duty ended in the summer of 1967. During this time, he became engaged to a woman he had known before going to Vietnam. When she broke off the engagement, he relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area, got married, and fathered a daughter. After he and his wife divorced, he moved back to Sacramento, where he found employment as a handyman.[2]

The murders

Yolanda Johnson (22) – found 18 June 1986.

Angela Polidore (25) – found 20 July 1986.

Maria Apodaca (18) – found 19 March 1987.

Cherie Washington (26) – found 20 April 1987.

Linda Vitela (24) – found 22 April 1987. She had been dead for about a year.

Sheila Jacox (17) – also found 22 April 1987 and had likewise been dead for about a year.

Sharon Massey (29) – found 29 April 1987 and had been dead for around 6 months.

Investigation[edit]

The investigation began with a report to police of the discovery of Yolanda Johnson's body. The report was made by Solomon.[4] Johnson had been bound, was found partially nude, was a drug user and a prostitute. Apodaca was bound, a drug user, a prostitute and buried wrapped up in bedding. Polidore was bound and partially nude. Washington may have been bound, nude, possibly a drug user, a prostitute and wrapped up in bedding. Vitela was nude, a drug user, a prostitute and wrapped in bedding. This was also true of Jacox. Massey was bound, nude, possibly a drug user, a prostitute and wrapped in bedding.[2] These common factors were interpreted by police to mean they were dealing with only one killer.[3]

Solomon possibly took the initiative to report Johnson's body in order to appear innocent.[3] Police questioned him after this discovery and he gave fingerprints and a blood sample, but he gave several inconsistent statements and he failed to properly identify himself. He was questioned a second time after Apodaca's body was discovered and gave false statements to police but later explained that he was concerned about outstanding misdemeanor warrants. On 20 April 1987 he gave police permission to search his (abandoned) car on a lot where he lived. When they were at the premises, police noted a depression in the soil, borrowed a shovel, excavated and discovered Washington's body. On 22 April 1987 police discovered Vitela and Jacox's bodies buried at a residence associated with Solomon. He was arrested. Police found Massey's body on the same lot where Apodaca's had been found.[2]

In the course of their investigation police had discovered that Solomon had said to a third party that he would kill Johnson over the theft of some stereo equipment and that Apodaca had visited him at his residence several times. It was also indicated that the sheet in which Apodaca's body was wrapped, came from his bed and that Washington had been seen following him into his bedroom.[2]

Trial and sentencing

The prosecution case was largely circumstantial, because there was no evidence directly connecting Solomon with the crimes. Witness testimony connected him as an acquaintance of some of the victims. Tellingly, except in one case, all the victims were found at locations where Solomon had either lived or had worked as a handyman. Although police had a blood sample, DNA testing was in its infancy and no connection was made by means of that technology. However, a semen sample had been collected from Johnson's body and it was determined to be consistent with Solomon's blood.[3]

During the trial defense attorneys, Peter P. Vlautin III and Constance Gutowsky, presented an extensive case in mitigation; 18 witnesses testified over the course of seven days.

The defense case largely attempted to show that defendant's crimes stemmed from psychopathology born from the abuse he suffered as a child, compounded by his tour of duty in Vietnam and his cocaine use.[2] Clinical forensic psychologist Brad Fisher and clinical psychologist John P. Wilson both testified that the abuse Solomon suffered as a child led to mental, emotional and behavioral problems that were strongly linked to his crimes.

Solomon was convicted of six of the murders; the charges were dropped with respect to the Polidore murder.[2]

Penalty phase

Solomon's first death penalty phase was declared a mistrial, though a second jury voted unanimously to put him to death in July 1992. When news about the case was made public, Solomon's victims who had survived his attacks, came forward and testified about their experiences. The following summarizes these incidents.[2]

Mary K. (18) testified about having been knifed 19 September 1969.

Virginia J. (20s) testified to having been grabbed from behind, threatened with a gun, forced into a car and subjected to sexual assault and rape 12 January 1971.

Dale W. testified that Solomon kicked her in the face (for which he was subsequently convicted of assault and intent to commit rape) on 17 May 1971.

Connie S. testified that Solomon pulled a chain over her neck, choked her to unconsciousness, urinated on her face, assaulted and raped her on 18 October 1975. He was convicted of aggravated assault and false imprisonment.

Darlene G (18) testified that she was choked to unconsciousness on December 1976. Solomon was convicted of assault with intent to commit rape and false imprisonment. This happened at San Quentin State Prison, where he worked as a forklift operator.

Solomon had also been convicted of three counts of grand theft in 1984 in Arizona.[2]

The second jury at the penalty phase unanimously decided on the death penalty and the decisions in this case were affirmed by the California Supreme Court.[2] Solomon was the 342nd person to receive the death sentence in California and is now on death row in San Quentin, California. His conviction was affirmed by the California Supreme Court on July 15, 2010.

Media

A documentary of Solomon's serial crimes appeared on the criminal documentary, "Crime Stories" at Discovery Channel and Biography Channel, featuring Antonio "Tony" Harvey, an Associated Press correspondent/author, retired Sacramento police detective John Cabrera and former Sacramento Bee photographer Tom Parker.

Antonio "Tony" Harvey, a correspondent for the Associated Press and journalism graduate from Sacramento State University, has completed a detailed true crime novel on Solomon's case. Currently, Harvey's book is titled, "The Homicidal Handyman of Oak Park."

Serial Killer Joseph E Duncan III Jazzi Jet Documentary

Serial Killer Joseph E Duncan III Jazzi Jet Documentary

Joseph Edward Duncan III (born February 25, 1963) is an American convicted serial killer and sex offender who is on death row in federal prison in conjunction with the 2005 kidnappings and murders of members of the Groene family of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. He is also serving 11 consecutive sentences of life without parole in conjunction with the same crimes as well as the 1997 murder of Anthony Martinez of Beaumont, California. Duncan has confessed to but not been charged with the 1996 murder of two girls in Seattle, Washington.

Born in Tacoma, Washington, Duncan's criminal history dates to when he was 15 years old. In 1980, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison for sexually assaulting a boy in Tacoma and as a result has spent all but six years of his adult life in prison. He was paroled in 1994 but was returned to prison in 1997 for violating the terms of his parole.

In May 2005, Kootenai County, Idaho authorities discovered the bodies of Brenda Groene, her boyfriend, and her 13-year-old son in the family home near Coeur d'Alene. Authorities also noted that Groene's two other children were missing: Shasta, 8, and Dylan, 9. After an intense search for the two children, Shasta was found alive with Duncan at a restaurant in Coeur d'Alene nearly seven weeks later, and Duncan was arrested in conjunction with her kidnapping. Dylan's remains were found days later in a remote area near St. Regis, Montana. Duncan was subsequently charged with murdering Dylan as well as the three victims at the Coeur d'Alene home.

During his incarceration, authorities connected Duncan with the unsolved murders of Anthony Martinez in California and two girls in Seattle, all of which occurred during Duncan's parole from 1994–1997. Of those murders, Duncan has only been charged in the California case. In all, Duncan has been convicted in Idaho for kidnapping and murdering the three victims in Coeur d'Alene, for which he was given six life sentences; in federal court for kidnapping Shasta and Dylan Groene and murdering Dylan, for which he was given three death sentences and three life sentences; and in the state of California for kidnapping and murdering Martinez, for which he was given two life sentences.

Early criminal history

Duncan has a long history as a violent sexual predator. He committed his first recorded sex crime in 1978 in his hometown of Tacoma, Washington, when he was 15 years old. In that incident, he raped a nine-year-old boy at gunpoint. The following year, he was arrested driving a stolen car. He was sentenced as a juvenile and sent to Dyslin's Boys' ranch in Tacoma, where he told a therapist who was assigned to his case that he had bound and sexually assaulted six boys, according to a report by the Associated Press. He also told the therapist that he estimated that he had raped 13 younger boys by the time he was 16.

In 1980, also in Tacoma, Duncan stole a number of guns from a neighbor and then abducted a 14-year-old boy and sodomized him at gunpoint. Duncan was sentenced to 20 years in prison, but was released on parole in 1994 after serving 14 years. While out on parole, Duncan is known to have lived in several places in the Seattle area. He was arrested in 1996 for marijuana use and released on parole several weeks later with new restrictions. Authorities believe that during his parole Duncan murdered Sammiejo White and Carmen Cubias in Seattle in 1996 and Anthony Martinez in Riverside County, California in 1997; however, both those cases went cold and were not tied to Duncan until after his arrest in the Groene case. Duncan was arrested in Kansas and returned to prison in 1997 after violating the terms of his parole;[3][10] he was released from prison on July 14, 2000 with time off for good behavior[10] and moved to Fargo, North Dakota.[11]

In March 2005, Duncan was charged with the July 3, 2004 molestation of two boys at a playground in Detroit Lakes, Minnesota. On April 5, 2005, he appeared before a Becker County judge, who set bail at US$15,000.[12] A Fargo businessman with whom Duncan had become acquainted helped him post bail; however, Duncan skipped bail and disappeared.[13] On June 1, 2005, a federal warrant was issued for Duncan's arrest on the charge of "unlawful flight to avoid prosecution."[14]

Idaho murders and kidnappings

On May 16, 2005, authorities discovered the bodies of Brenda Groene, 40; her boyfriend, Mark McKenzie, 37; and her son, Slade Groene, 13, in their home along Lake Coeur d'Alene, outside the city of Coeur d'Alene.[4] Two of Brenda Groene's other children, Dylan, 9, and Shasta, 8, were missing. An AMBER Alert was issued and searchers combed the area for the missing children while authorities investigated the deaths at the home as homicides.[4] Autopsies determined the cause of death to be "blunt trauma to the head"; authorities also noted that the victims had been bound.[15]

Seven weeks later, in the early morning hours of July 2, 2005, Shasta Groene was seen at a Denny's restaurant in Coeur d'Alene in the company of an unknown man. A waitress, manager, and two customers at the restaurant recognized Shasta from the media attention. They surreptitiously called police and positioned themselves to prevent the man from leaving.[16] Police officers arrived at the restaurant and arrested the man, later identified as Duncan, without incident.[16] Shasta Groene identified herself to a waitress at the restaurant and to authorities, and was taken to Kootenai Medical Center for medical treatment and to be reunited with her father.[14] Coeur d'Alene police, meanwhile, detained Duncan on kidnapping charges and on his outstanding federal warrant.[14]

When Shasta Groene was found without Dylan, authorities held little hope of finding the boy alive. Police asked the public for tips, specifically with respect to sightings of the stolen red Jeep Cherokee with Missouri license plates that Duncan was driving at the time of his arrest.[17] Authorities discovered that Duncan had rented the car in Minnesota and never returned it. A gas station employee in Kellogg, about 40 miles (64 km) east of Coeur d'Alene, recognized the vehicle as one that had stopped at her station hours before Duncan was arrested.[17] The employee suspected the girl wandering around the station might have been Shasta, but did not confront her, as nothing appeared out of the ordinary. The employee and her manager notified authorities after reviewing surveillance camera footage and seeing Duncan and Shasta in the video.[17]

Many tips provided to authorities centered around remote areas along the Idaho–Montana border. On July 4, 2005, investigators found human remains at a remote makeshift campsite in the Lolo National Forest near St. Regis, Montana.[18] The remains were sent to the FBI lab in Quantico, Virginia for DNA testing and were positively identified as Dylan Groene.[18]

Shasta Groene's interview

Much of what is known about the murders of the Groene family was revealed by Shasta Groene herself. According to Shasta Groene's police interview, Duncan killed her mother, older brother and her mother's fiance and then took her and her brother away in the red Jeep Cherokee.

Shasta told investigators her mother called her into the living room, from her bedroom where she had been sleeping, and she saw Duncan wearing black gloves and holding a gun. Her captor tied her mother's hands with nylon zip ties, and did the same to her mother's fiance and her brother Slade. Dylan and Shasta were removed from the house and placed inside the stolen rental car. While she waited with her brother, she heard her mother's fiance scream out and then saw her injured older brother staggering away from the entrance to the home. Duncan then bludgeoned the three to death; neither Shasta nor Dylan witnessed the murders. Both Shasta and Dylan were removed to other locations, where they were repeatedly molested for six weeks. She said that they drove a long distance and stayed in two different campsites, where Duncan told her of having beaten her family members to death with a hammer.[19]

Other crimes

Duncan's arrest led the FBI to launch a nationwide review of unsolved missing child cases. He was implicated as a possible suspect in several crimes that occurred between 1994 and 1997, when he was on parole, and between 2000 and 2005, when he was free from prison. Although he was cleared as a suspect in some cases, authorities in California and Washington had enough evidence to believe Duncan had committed unsolved murders in their jurisdictions.

Anthony Martinez[edit]

On April 4, 1997, 10-year-old Anthony Michael Martinez was playing with friends in the front yard of his home in Beaumont, California, when an unknown man approached the group asking for help finding a missing cat. When the boys refused, the man grabbed Martinez at knifepoint and threw him into his vehicle.[13] After a 2-week search, on April 19 Martinez's body was found nude and partially decomposed in Indio. Investigators noted that he had been sexually assaulted and bound with duct tape.[13] Although a composite sketch of the suspect was made available and a partial fingerprint taken from the duct tape found on Martinez's body, the case eventually went cold.

In July 2005, bloggers noticed similarities between Duncan and the composite sketch in the Martinez case, as well as between Duncan's vehicle and the one Martinez's assailant was driving.[13] The FBI and National Center for Missing and Exploited Children became involved, and in turn contacted Riverside County authorities. Riverside authorities were able to match the fingerprint taken from Martinez's body to Duncan, and on August 3 the Riverside County Sheriff officially announced Duncan's connection with the Martinez case.

Sammiejo White and Carmen Cubias

Federal prosecutors also revealed that Duncan confessed to the murders of Sammiejo White, 11, and her sister, Carmen Cubias, 9, who vanished on July 6, 1996, after leaving the Crest Motel in Seattle, Washington, to panhandle. Their remains were found February 10, 1998, in Bothell, Washington.[20]

Trials

Joseph E. Duncan III has been convicted by three separate courts: first, by the state of Idaho for the kidnapping and murders of Brenda and Slade Groene and Mark McKenzie; second, by U.S. federal court for the kidnapping of Shasta and Dylan Groene, the murder of Dylan Groene, and various other crimes; and third, by the state of California for the kidnapping and murder of Anthony Martinez.

Idaho[edit]

Duncan first appeared in a Kootenai County court on July 13, 2005, where he was charged with three counts of first-degree murder and three counts of first degree kidnapping, all in conjunction with the deaths of Brenda and Slade Groene and Mark McKenzie.[21] Kootenai County prosecutors had initially planned to charge Duncan with the kidnappings of Shasta and Dylan Groene; however, they deferred those charges to the federal courts, as transporting children across state lines for the purpose of sexual exploitation is a federal offense.[21] Trial was set to begin on January 17, 2006, but was delayed until April 4, after the district judge granted a request to the defense for more time to prepare for the trial, and then again to October 26, after the judge in the case stated that "No one wants to try this case twice, including me."[22] Duncan's attorneys blamed the multiple postponements on the prosecution's insistence on pursuing the death penalty.[22]

On October 16, 2006, shortly after jury selection began, Kootenai County prosecutors and Duncan's attorney reached a plea bargain in which Duncan pleaded guilty to all state charges against him.[23] He was immediately sentenced to three consecutive life sentences without the possibility of parole for the three kidnapping charges.[23] Sentencing on the three murder charges was continued pending the outcome of his federal trial on kidnapping and murder charges; the judge said that if he did not receive the death penalty on the federal charges, he would return to Kootenai County for a death penalty phase on the state murder charges.[23] Over two years later, after being sentenced to death on federal charges, Kootenai County sentenced Duncan to three additional life sentences.[24] Duncan also agreed to cooperate with Kootenai County sheriff's detectives investigating his crimes and provide passwords to encrypted files stored on his computer.[23]

U.S. federal court

On January 18, 2007, Duncan was indicted by a federal grand jury in Coeur d'Alene on 10 counts of "kidnapping, kidnapping resulting in death, aggravated sexual abuse of a minor, and sexual exploitation of a child resulting in death," and other crimes related to illegal firearm possession and vehicle theft.[25] He was arraigned the following day at a federal court in Boise, Idaho, where a judge ordered Duncan to stand trial the following March.[25] Duncan's defense attorneys immediately requested a postponement,[25] which was granted the week the trial was originally scheduled to begin; a new trial date was set for January 22, 2008.[26]

On December 3, 2007, Duncan pleaded guilty to all 10 charges against him.[27] As a condition of the agreement, Shasta Groene would not have to testify in the penalty phase of the trial. Due to a gag order, other details of the plea agreement were not released.

Jury selection for the penalty phase for Duncan's federal trial began on April 14, 2008. During jury selection, Duncan dismissed his attorneys and chose to represent himself. His attorneys objected, asserting he was not competent to do so, and requested a formal hearing as to the issue. The district court ordered an evaluation of Duncan to determine his competence, and accepted the evaluator's conclusion that he was competent to proceed without counsel.

On August 27, 2008, after three hours of deliberation, the jury recommended the death penalty, and the judge imposed three death sentences for "kidnapping resulting in death, sexual exploitation of a child resulting in death, and use of a firearm in a violent crime resulting in death," all related to the death of Dylan Groene. On November 3, 2008, Duncan was sentenced to an additional three consecutive terms of life without parole in federal prison for kidnapping Shasta Groene and for sexually abusing Shasta and Dylan.

Duncan's standby counsel filed a notice of appeal. Duncan subsequently wrote the court and informed it that any appeal was taken "against his wishes".

In July 2011, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the district court's decision to permit Duncan to represent himself without first holding a hearing as to his competence to do so and remanded for a hearing as to this issue.

As of May 18, 2012, on remand, the district court had not set a competency hearing. As of September 2012, Duncan is incarcerated at the United States Penitentiary, Terre Haute in Indiana.

California

On January 18, 2007, the same day Duncan was indicted in federal court, Riverside County officials announced that Duncan was charged with Martinez's murder.[25] Despite attempts by Riverside County officials to extradite Duncan to California, including an appeal by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Duncan's federal trial proceeded. He was eventually extradited to California on January 24, 2009, five months after being sentenced to death by the federal court.[34]

On March 15, 2011, Duncan pleaded guilty to Martinez's murder, and was sentenced to two life terms on April 5, 2011.[35] As part of a plea deal, the sentence comes without the possibility of parole or right to appeal.[2][36] Although Duncan could have faced a separate death sentence in addition to the ones he had already been sentenced to in federal court, Riverside County District Attorney Paul Zellerbach justified the life sentence by stating that he had consulted with the Martinez family who wanted closure in the case and that "the federal system will kill him long before the state of California would have seriously considered it."[2]

"The Fifth Nail" and "Fifth Nail Revelations"

Prior to his arrest for murder, Duncan published his ideas on the Internet. He titled it "The Fifth Nail", which is also the URL for his personal website.[37] According to lore, in addition to the four nails used to pierce the body of Jesus Christ in his crucifixion, there was a fifth nail that was taken away and hidden by Romani. Duncan adopted the name for his own website and blog. The website depicted Duncan's day-to-day life as a sex offender.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_E._Duncan_III