Joseph Duncan Must Die says Jury

Joseph Edward Duncan III, 45, was sentenced to death by a jury in Boise, Idaho for the 2005 kidnapping, torture and murder of a 9-year-old boy, Dylan Groene.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WVNu4YqvrA&eurl=http://news.google.com/news?q=joseph+edward+duncan+iii+video&ie=UTF-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US]

"We're happy with the verdict, but it's a shame — this should have been limited to one death," said Steven Groene, the father of the children. "He should have had the courage and the guts to kill himself before killing anyone else."

In his closing arguments the prosecutor reminded the jury of the many crimes committed by Duncan and summed up by saying:

"This defendant is dangerous. He is a predator who takes pride in his work," prosecutor Traci Whelan said. "He earned this day. His actions ... call out for the death penalty."

The heinousness of the evidence in Dylan's murder made it particularly difficult for the jurors to remain impartial as they deliberate, said Art Patterson, a jury consultant and senior vice president of the trial consulting firm DecisionQuest.

"Generally, for human beings, it's pretty hard to maintain impartiality when confronted with such horror," Patterson said.

"How could any juror not want to see this person removed from our list of living human beings? How could you live with yourself as a juror if there's any chance this human being could escape from jail and do something like this again?" Patterson said.

After 3 hours of deliberation, the jury agreed with the prosecutor and returned a unanimous verdict of death.

"The jury speaks the mind of the community," U.S. Attorney Tom Moss said. "By the verdict today, they have given voice to the victims."

Joseph Duncan had a long history as a violent sexual predator. He had spent time in prison for the gunpoint rape of a young boy in the 1980's. He gained national notoriety, and spot on the FBI's most wanted list, for his involvement in the kidnappings and murders that eventually lead to his death sentence. He was also featured on the TV program America's Most Wanted.

Duncan kidnapped Dylan Groene and his sister Shasta from their home, after brutally murdering their mother Brenda Groene, her boyfriend Mark McKenzie and their older brother Slade Groene. He had tied them up and mercilessly bludgeoned all three of them to death with a hammer. He took the two children and for the next 6 weeks repeatedly raped and sexually molested both of them in various campgrounds before shooting Dylan in the head and burning his body in front of his sister. Duncan was so perverted that he made a videotape.

At his trial jurors viewed horrifying video Duncan made of him sexually abusing, torturing and hanging Dylan until the boy lost consciousness.

Duncan was arrested and Shasta rescued weeks after the kidnappings when a waitress at a Denny's in Coeur d'Alene called police after recognizing the two as they ate. He pleaded guilty in December to 10 federal charges involving the kidnappings and the murder of Dylan. He pleaded guilty to the other three murders in state court, where he also could be sentenced to death.

With multiple murder convictions and a death sentence hanging over his head, the law is not yet finished with Joseph Edward Duncan III. Prosecutors in Riverside County, California say they know of Duncan's murderous past. Duncan is charged in the 1997 murder of 10-year-old Anthony Martinez, and they are still waiting to put Duncan on trial.

Duncan is suspected of abducting Martinez at knife-point from his front yard. Fifteen days later, Martinez was found dead. At the time of Martinez's murder, Duncan was wanted for violating his parole in Washington, as he failed a drug test and fled the state. Riverside County District Attorney Rod Pacheco said he's glad juries in Idaho are holding Duncan accountable, but now it's time for him to face justice in California. Despite the potential cost of a death penalty case, Pacheco says the Martinez family deserves to see Duncan tried.

"It's not something where you go, well, you can wait a couple years. We can't wait," Pacheco says. "We need him today. I understand Idaho needs to finish their stuff, but we need him as soon as possible. I can't wait."

For complete coverage of the Joseph Duncan case see KXLY.COM and also True Crime Report.Com.

5-Year-Old Boy Tortured and Abused

Starkeisha Brown's 5-year-old son, who suffered "unbearable psychological and physical abuse" demonstrates the strength of the human spirit in the face of adversity. His will to live after enduring the  horrible torture at the hands of his own mother and her live-in girlfriend, Krystal Matthews, 21, is truly amazing. His name has not been released.

"I've never seen anyone with these kinds of injuries who has lived," Assistant Police Chief James McDonnell told reporters last week. "This kid must have a tremendous will to live, to be able to still hang on despite what he's been through."

In his 5 short years:

• He was hung by his hands and wrists from a door jamb and beaten
  


• He was routinely denied food and water.
  


• He was burned with cigarettes all over his body, including his genitals.
  


• He was left to sit in his own urine and feces.
  


• His hands were held to a hot stove that may leave them permanently disfigured.

The boy's physical appearance was also striking. He had a pot belly suggestive of severe malnutrition, burns across his body in various stages of healing, old scars, bruises, and badly damaged and burned hands, he also had a broken tooth with the nerve end exposed. Lt. Vincent Neglia of the LAPD's Abused Child Unit, said the abuse was obviously continuous and prolonged.

"This wasn't just one big beating," Neglia said. "You can tell by the different stages of injuries that this was prolonged."

The boy remains in hospital, after suffering kidney failure due to malnutrition. Authorities describe him as withdrawn and shy but plays with people he trusts. He has a healthy appetite and began walking over the weekend with a slight limp. His burnt hand is healing well and regaining its range of motion.

The mother, Starkeisha Brown, 24, and Krystal Matthews, 21, who lived together at a South Los Angeles apartment near 110th and Figueroa streets, were charged with one count each of torture, child abuse, corporal injury to a child, dissuading a witness, and two counts each of conspiracy. A district attorney's office statement identified Matthews as the live-in girlfriend of Brown. A baby sitter, La Tanya Monikue Jones, 26, was added to the case. Prosecutors charged her with child abuse, corporal injury to a child, conspiracy and conspiracy to dissuade a witness. Jones allegedly burned the 5-year-old's hand over a stove at one point while baby-sitting, according to prosecutors.

Brown and Matthews appeared in Superior Court in Compton but their arraignment was postponed to June 25. Brown was held on $1.1 million bail. Matthews was remanded to custody without bail because of a probation violation. Both face up to 25 years to life in prison if convicted. Jones is being held on $180,000 bail. She faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

The boy was finally rescued from his abusers after an anonymous tip from a stranger. On June 4th a woman called the abuse hotline saying that the little boy told her at a train station that his mother had burned his hand on top of a hot stove. That call prompted the Department of Children and Family Services to set up an appointment with Starkeisha Brown and Krystal Matthews on Monday, June 9th, to discuss the allegation.

Knowing that she could not attend the meeting with her son, who showed obvious signs of abuse, Brown concocted a scheme to fool the authorities. She "borrowed" the healthy 4-year-old son of La Tanya Monikue Jones and his 6-year-old sister. She planned to pass off the 4-year-old as her own son. Brown and her girlfriend then asked a complete stranger to watch her 5-year-old son while they went to the meeting.

While the women were being interviewed, the stranger who had been asked to watch the boy started asking people in the neighborhood what he should do with the 5-year-old, who looked sickly and injured. Eventually someone called authorities. Officials got word of the boy's condition as they were interviewing Brown and Matthews and began asking more pointed questions and challenging the pair's story. Halfway through the interview the two women sprinted from the office, abandoning the 4-year-old and his sister at the office, police said. The children are now in the care of the authorities.

"They realize that no one is buying their ruse," said Lt. Vincent Neglia of the LAPD's Abused Child Unit, and "they bug out."

Capt. Fabian Lizarraga said it was fortunate that the stranger sought help. He "had the sense that something was not right, that the situation he had been placed in was not right," the captain said.

Authorities launched a hunt for Brown and Matthews while authorities took the 5-year-old child to a hospital. Matthews was arrested Friday and Brown turned herself in to police on Saturday. Both women have accounts on the popular MySpace website. See Starkreisha Brown here and Krystal Matthews' is here. Both women also have criminal records.

Brown is a known gang member who as a minor served time in the California Youth Authority for battery. She also served a total of two and a half years in prison for two separate convictions: one for felony robbery of an elderly woman in 2003 and later for petty theft, when she and another woman stole a bracelet and other items from a Macy's department store.

Most recently, Brown was incarcerated from March 2006 to January 2007. During that period, the boy was in the custody of his grandmother, authorities said. Brown regained custody of her son when she left prison in January 2007. But that March, a judge issued an arrest warrant for her in connection with parole violations. It is unclear why officials could not locate her.

Matthews also has a criminal history, including convictions for assault with a deadly weapon and forgery. In May, Matthews got into a fight with her younger brother, slashing him in the face with a box-cutter. She was arrested and eventually pleaded guilty. She was sentenced to 3 years probation.

Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) is investigating why no one followed up an initial case review after a tip in November 2005 that the boy was neglected and at risk while in the care of his grandmother, who took the boy in after his mother was arrested for shoplifting.

An array of other agencies missed their chance to intervene, said Gloria Molina, a member of the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, including the state Department of Corrections and the county's Department of Probation, Department of Mental Health and foster care agencies that had case files for Brown and the two other women charged in the case. Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky blamed a "silo" mentality of agencies that do not reflexively alert one another to potential risks posed by cases.

"Why was there no intervention? It shouldn't have to be from the hotline," Molina said.

Friends and family say they suspected that Starkeisha Brown beat her 5-year-old son but nobody called authorities. Such problems are particularly present in neighborhoods like the one where the Browns lived, where distrust of police and child-protection workers is high and residents worry that calling authorities could make problems worse.

"I don't think it is that they are colluding with the abuser," said Carole Shauffer, executive director of the Youth Law Center, a San Francisco-based public interest law firm. "For the most part, it's fear of what's going to happen, fear of nothing happening, fear of collateral consequences, and denial, that 'it's none of my business, and it can't be as bad as it seems to me.' "

The boy's great-grandmother, Barbara Moreno, said she noticed cuts, scratches and bumps on him, but dropped the subject when he told her the injuries were caused by a fall and a dog attack.

"Sometimes you turn your head," said Vivian Daniels, a family friend who about a month ago finally asked Brown about the bruises and scratches on her son's body. She said she didn't call police or the Department of Children and Family Services because she feared it would make things worse for the boy and perhaps even for her and her children.

"It's tit-for-tat," Daniels said. "In South-Central, we don't do that. I'm just telling you how it is."

"We have seen time and time again that people say, 'I've seen child abuse, I've heard it, I've heard screams, but I do nothing,' " said Earl Ofari Hutchinson, president of the Los Angeles Urban Policy Roundtable. "People are so reluctant to speak out on it."

Hutchinson and others said suspicion and fear of authorities runs deep in parts of South L.A. and that extends beyond the police to social service agencies and other public providers. They said some people are afraid that calling authorities could end up making the family situation worse -- particularly if the child is taken into foster care. Others fear authorities might end up checking on them.

In response to the case, community activists on Friday canvassed the neighborhood around 110th and Figueroa streets, where Brown recently lived with the boy, with fliers that read: "Break the Silence on Child Abuse in South L.A.! Help Make Sure a Starkeisha Brown Torture Case Never Happens Again."