TheTrenchcoat Chronicles

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  • Immunity granted

    Immunity granted

    Kerns case will go to trial in fall:

    I’m still not holding my breath on that one, but in other news, Farley and Sullivan have been granted immunity in the trial of Tobin Kerns…

    A single justice of the Supreme Judicial Court ruled last week to enact immunity for two key witnesses in Kerns upcoming trial, bringing an end to another legal stalemate that had kept the case from moving forward.

    Kerns, 18, and Joseph Nee, 20, both former Marshfield High School students, are facing trial separately for their alleged involvement in staging a Columbine-like attack on the high school in 2004. Kerns, was arrested in September of that year after Nee and two other MHS students – Joseph Sullivan and Daniel Farely – informed he school resource officer about the plot. A few weeks later, Nee was also arrested after Farley and Sullivan implicated him in the planned attack on the school.

    Kerns and Nee were both charged with promotion of anarchy, conspiracy to commit murder and threatened use of a deadly weapon after police found materials at Kerns’ home outlining a planned attack on Marshfield High School. Police found a binder and evidence that Kerns’ computer had been used to look at Web sites like the Anarchist’s Cookbook, which explains how to make explosives. Nee had been staying with the Kerns family for a few weeks earlier in the spring, and Kerns father, Ben has argued that the materials in the binder belonged to him, not his son.

    Kerns’ trial was set to start in March, but things came to a standstill when Farley and Sullivan sought immunity under the Fifth Amendment out of fear they might incriminate themselves through their testimonies.

    The Plymouth County District Attorney’s office then sought to enact immunity in the Nee trial in hopes of carrying immunity over into the Kerns trial.

    While immunity was granted to both witnesses in Superior Court, Judge Louis Coffin said in April he was unsure if he had the authority to grant immunity in Juvenile Court, citing a ruling in Commonwealth vs. Russ, a 2001 case that set a precedent against enacting immunity in juvenile cases. Assistant District Attorney John McLaughlin then brought the matter before a single Supreme Judicial Court Justice in Boston.

    If this helps Tobin get exonerated, then I’m all for it, but I can’t shake the feeling that two people who were complicit in the plot are getting away.

  • Zero Day

    Zero Day

    Last night, I watched the movie Zero Day. For those of you who haven’t heard of Zero Day, it’s about a fictitious school shooting filmed from the point of view of the shooters much like what Harris and Klebold did with their basement tapes.

    As far as movies about school shootings go, Zero Day is the best. It is much more interesting than the crap fest that is Elephant, and much more realistic than Home Room. In my opinion, the director tried to make it like Columbine without it actually being Columbine.

    What at first I didn’t like about the movie turns out makes the movie better and more disturbing. In the actual basement tapes, you can see the anger and hatred in Harris and Klebold. In Zero Day, the actors were much more subdued about the whole thing.

    My only complaint about the film isn’t with the film itself, it’s the fact that the mutants look at this as almost a “fan film” when I’m pretty sure that this was not the film’s intent.

    Anyway, I won’t spoil any more of it, but I highly recommend that anybody, especially those with kids still in school, to watch this movie.

  • Morbid Curiosity

    Morbid Curiosity

    Sheriff: ‘Morbid Curiosity’ Given As Motive For Killing Teen:

    I’ve been blogging about various crimes for 6 years now. I’ve become almost detached from my emotions when writing about these stories. Until I read this article. I almost flung my laptop across the room. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s because I have a (step)daughter her age…

    RICHMOND, Texas — Morbid curiosity was given as the motive by one of two suspects charged with killing 16-year-old Ashton Glover, KPRC Local 2 reported Monday.

    Matthew McCombs arrived in Fort Bend County Monday afternoon after he waived extradition from Michigan, where he and Sean Brown were captured while trying to cross the U.S.-Canada border into Ontario.

    McCombs and Brown, both 18, were charged with murder in the death of Glover on Wednesday.

    McCombs has given a statement,” Fort Bend County Sheriff Milton Wright said. “We think the statement, at this point, is pretty accurate because it’s collaborated by some of the facts that we have.”

    Wright said McCombs implicated Brown in the killing but admitted to pulling the trigger.

    “The pistol that we recovered in the search warrant at McCombs’ house is indeed the murder weapon,” Wright said. “Mr. McCombs pulled the trigger (with a) 22-32. It’s an old model replica, a frontier model, an old pistol. You can still buy ammunition for it, I think, but those guns have been out of production for some time.”

    He said that McCombs stole the gun from a friend’s grandmother’s house in Kerrville.

    Wright did not elaborate on the statement or motive in order to not jeopardize the case. He also would not say why Glover was the victim.

    “I’ll have to stop with the statement made — morbid curiosity. Of course, there are more answers to that, but, after conferring with the district attorney and others, they requested that we not go beyond that,” he said.

    Matthew McCombs, may God have mercy on your soul.

  • Pamela Rogers gets 7 years

    Pamela Rogers gets 7 years

    Pamela Rogers

    7-year term jolts a tearful Rogers:

    Everyone’s favorite statutory rapist is going to do time in the pokey…

    McMINNVILLE, Tenn. Near the end of the 59-minute probation violation hearing, convicted sexual offender Pamela Rogers rose to address the judge who would send her to jail for more than seven years.

    “I’m sorry,” she began.

    The tears fell first as a trickle that she wiped away with a wad of tissue in a handcuffed hand, but the salty flow quickly became a river of sobs as she further apologized for the pain and the embarrassment her actions of the past two years had brought her victim and his family, her family and her friends.

    Then the former elementary school gym teacher asked Circuit Court Judge Bart Stanley for mercy.

    But the judge was not in a generous mood.

    Less than four minutes after her tearful apology, Stanley sternly took the young woman to task for her behavior since she was paroled in February.

    “The thing I can’t understand is why, when you were released after seven or eight months in jail, you didn’t blink an eye. You continued at that point to violate your probation and contacted this family, send lewd videos and lewd pictures to the same person,” the judge told the hushed courtroom.

    Sitting two rows behind Rogers in the spectators’ gallery, her parents, Lamar and Karen Rogers, lowered their chins and wiped away tears.

    In order to deliver a message to the state of Tennessee, the judge said in a measured voice, he was sending Rogers to the Tennessee Prison for Women to serve the remainder of the eight-year sentence that she received in August after pleading no-contest to four counts of sexual battery.

    The charges involved a sexual relationship with a teenage boy, then 14, who was a student at the school where Rogers taught, Centertown Elementary. Court documents indicate she had sex with him multiple times, at school, in her car and at his home. After her conviction, she served a few months in jail, then was released on probation and ordered not to communicate with the boy.

    However, authorities said that, less than two months later, she sent explicit photos and videos of herself to the boy via cameraphone. They also said she had created a Web page through MySpace.com on which she posted messages to the boy, addressing him by his basketball jersey number, saying she was still in love with him and suggesting she would wait until he turned 18 to continue their romance.

    “I don’t mind giving someone a second chance if there’s a reasonable likelihood that they can be rehabilitated, that they will take probation seriously in an attempt to straighten their life out,” the judge said in court Friday. “We all make mistakes, but you have done everything except show this court that you wanted to abide by the terms of your probation and get your life back in order and follow the law.”

    The decision pleased District Attorney General Dale Potter, who told reporters: “She deserves what she got.”

    Actually, she deserved more, but why should we let justice get in the way of a double standard?

  • Pistol found at McCombs home

    Pistol found at McCombs home

    Glover Murder Suspect Admits Part In Killing; Pistol Found At His Home:

    Just a brief update…

    Matthew McCombs, one of two suspects in the murder of Sugar Land teenager Ashton Glover, has given detectives a “self-implicating statement,” Fort Bend County Sheriff Milton Wright said Monday morning.

    Investigators also have discovered a pistol at McCombs’ home in Sugar Land, the sheriff said. However, test results are not yet available that could indicate whether or not the weapon was used in Glover’s death.

  • McCombs confesses

    McCombs confesses

    Police: Teen admits being involved in Sugar Land murder:

    One of Ashton Glover’s killers has confessed…

    RICHMOND–One of the teens charged in the slaying of Ashton Glover has given police a statement admitting his involvement in the killing, Fort Bend County officials said today.

    Investigators were preparing to bring Matthew R. McCombs, 18, from the St. Clair County jail in Port Huron, Michigan to Texas when the teen told police he wanted to talk, Chief Deputy Craig Brady of the Fort Bend County Sheriff’s office said today.

    ”Ultimately he gave confession admitting his involvement in the murder,” Brady said.

    Brady declined to provide any details about McComb’s statement other than it took several hours.

    Fort Bend County Sheriff Milton Wright said the statement greatly strengthens the state’s case against the pair.

    “It makes the case. We had a good case, I think now we have an airtight case,” Wright said.

    Wright said the statement corroborates evidence already collected in the probe.

    McCombs and Sean H. Berry, 18, both of Sugar Land, were arrested Wednesday night trying to enter Canada from Port Huron.

    From the impression I get, it sounds like he’s rolling over on his partner, Sean Brown. I also get the impression that Brown is the “ringleader”.

  • Dyleski jury selection starts today

    Dyleski jury selection starts today

    JURY SELECTION SET TO BEGIN IN SCOTT DYLESKI MURDER TRIAL:

    For those interested…

    Jury selection is scheduled to begin this morning in Martinez in the murder trial of 17-year-old Scott Dyleski of Lafayette.

    The teenager is accused of the Oct. 15 killing of 52-year-old Pamela Vitale at the Lafayette home she shared with her husband, lawyer and legal commentator Daniel Horowitz.

    On Friday, Contra Costa County Superior Court Judge Barbara Zuniga denied a defense motion to move the murder trial out of the county because of allegedly prejudicial pretrial publicity.

    Zuniga ruled that moving the trial would do no good, saying “The nature of the crime will be the same wherever this case is tried.”

    Jury selection is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. in Department 2 of the A.F. Bray Building, 1020 Ward St., Martinez.

    I wonder how long this will take?

  • Newman’s sentencing appeal denied

    Judge says teenager in shooting should receive house arrest:

    The appeal for the ridiculously light sentence Pine Middle School shooter James Scott Newman received has been denied…

    A judge on Friday agreed that a 14-year-old Pine Middle School student who shot a classmate should be sentenced to house arrest.

    Prosecutors challenged Court Master Janet Schmuck’s May ruling involving James Newman, who said he brought his father’s gun to school March 14 because he was sick of being made fun of.

    But Washoe District Family Court Judge Frances Doherty sided with Schmuck’s ruling, dismissing claims that Schmuck abused her discretion.

    Washoe County District Attorney Richard Gammick had called Schmuck’s ruling “crazy,” and during Friday’s hearing, Deputy District Attorney Jo Lee Wickes said Schmuck’s decision did not consider public safety.

    Wickes added that Newman would benefit more from being incarcerated because he would have more education, socialization and recreation opportunities.

    Newman’s attorney, David Houston, said the boy is doing well on house arrest and that psychiatrists deemed him a low risk to commit similar violent offenses.

    Houston said the prosecutor’s claim that Schmuck abused her discretion was based on “societal revenge” because he was not incarcerated for a crime that sent fear through the school and the community.

    Schmuck has said she struggled with the sentencing and wanted to give Newman and his family a chance to “make it work.”

    Schmuck ordered that Newman and his family undergo counseling, that all weapons be removed from their home and that he complete 200 hours of community service.

    Newman also cannot get a driver’s license until 90 days after his 16th birthday and can’t get a hunting license for two years.

    Justice in Reno is not only blind, it’s also brain-damaged.

  • Kevin Newland charged with murder

    Newland charged with Jamie Drake’s murder:

    Kevin Newland has been officially charged with the murder of Jamie Lynn Drake…

    SPOKANE — Kevin Newland was charged in Spokane Superior Court Thursday for the murder of 19-year-old Jamie Lynn Drake. It’s a case where prosecutors are now alleging that robbery was the primary motive in the young woman’s murder.

    New court documents show that when detectives searched Drake’s Ford Mustang after it was recovered in Newland’s possession in western Washington,they found the victim’s stolen credit card sitting right next to the suspect’s wallet in the car’s center console.

    Even though Newland, 20, allegedly admitted strangling Drake to death, Spokane Medical Examiner Dr. Sally Aiken says it appears she was suffocated by a bag placed over her head.

    Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich says Drake was a truly innocent casualty of crime.

    “Miss Drake was still in her work uniform when this happened. She was a very hard working, young individual and it appears he took all that away,” he said.

    Newland’s MySpace is still up and running.

  • Change of venue denied

    Change of venue denied

    Judge denies change of venue in Dyleski trial:

    That was quick…

    MARTINEZ – A Superior Court judge today denied a request to move the murder trial of Scott Dyleski out of Contra Costa County.

    Judge Barbara Zuniga said she reviewed more than 200 newspaper accounts of the case and found that the reports reflected “actual proceedings in court” but did not contain material prejudicial to the defendant.

    Zuniga heard arguments Thursday on the defense change of venue motion. A CSU Chico professor testified that an “exceeding” high number of county residents were familiar with the Dyleski case and that more than 60 percent had decided that he was guilty.

    The judge said Friday that she placed “little weight” on Ross’ study.

    Back to the drawing board for the defense.