Random things about this case...

[Cappuccino]

I've no doubt Spitz was brilliant in his prime, but he's reminding me a bit of one of those divas who keep performing one last farewell concert over and over again. He should just retire already.

Wrt your accident theory - like I said about the human bite marks - anything's possible, but its not very probable. For one thing how would you explain the blow to Stevie's face that mashed the inside of his mouth against his teeth? That was delivered pre-mortem, if it was all an accident how did that happen?

 

[Compassionate Reader]

He smashed his face against the ladder on his way down?

Like I said, I'm pretty sold on Hobbs as the killer, but the CA trial made me mentally revive one of my first ideas when I read about the rebar, the first time I read the Manhole Theory. Contrary to what some of the nons on this board have implied, I'm not just some brainless robot in lock step with anything and everything that points away from the WM3. I do read, even at Callahan's, and I do form my own opinions.

(Sorry, Cappuccino, this is not directed at you. I've just been criticized by several nons on this board by their implications that either I don't read "the trial documents" or that I form my opinions based on celebrity opinions or by only watching the documentaries, neither of which is true. I guess I just felt the need to set the record straight. :rant

 

[DIXIECAT]

Does anyone know how far those "splashes" could have traveled that RC heard at 9pm on 5/5? I haven't seen any real discussion of that except that he was about 500 yards from the dump site. Sound can carry a purty fur piece in the woods and around water....
:waitasec:

 

[Wishbone]

Just saw the movie "conviction". Talk about a railroad job. I'm not convinced the WM3 were guilty as the evidence I've seen doesn't support a guilty verdict IMO.

"Kenny Waters served 18 years in prison for murder he didn’t commit before DNA testing proved his innocence. His sister, Betty Anne Waters, put herself through college and law school in order to help with her brother’s case. She worked with the Innocence Project to bring about his exoneration in 2001."

complete story here
http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/Kenny_Waters.php

 

[Ozarka]

Does anyone know how far those "splashes" could have traveled that RC heard at 9pm on 5/5? I haven't seen any real discussion of that except that he was about 500 yards from the dump site. Sound can carry a purty fur piece in the woods and around water....
:waitasec:

Where do I find more info about this? TIA

 

[Cappuccino]

Just saw the movie "conviction". Talk about a railroad job. I'm not convinced the WM3 were guilty as the evidence I've seen doesn't support a guilty verdict IMO.

"Kenny Waters served 18 years in prison for murder he didn’t commit before DNA testing proved his innocence. His sister, Betty Anne Waters, put herself through college and law school in order to help with her brother’s case. She worked with the Innocence Project to bring about his exoneration in 2001."

complete story here
http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/Kenny_Waters.php

And here's another one...

http://www.innocenceproject.org/Con...sippi_Murder_Cases_Hearing_Set_for_Friday.php

 

[Wishbone]

And here's another one...

http://www.innocenceproject.org/Con...sippi_Murder_Cases_Hearing_Set_for_Friday.php

The corruption involved in both these cases and the one I referenced are a disgrace and seem to happen frequently.

 

[HRCODEPINK]

The corruption involved in both these cases and the one I referenced are a disgrace and seem to happen frequently.

You have no idea.........truly.

 

[Pensfan]

I don't "disbelieve" all the experts. I'm thinking that the "animal predation" on the genitals could have been accomplished by a member of the human species.

I strongly agree. The boys were found submerged naked in a stream and they had been there for many hours. Their clothes were found elsewhere in the stream except for two of the boys’ underwear. I think the missing portion of the penis was taken with the underwear.

 

[mtnone]

I may have missed this somewhere, there is so much to read on this case, but didn't Christopher die due to bleed loss as the COD, rather than drowning? I assumed this was due to the genital damage, but if it was caused by animals, wouldn't that have been postmortem? In which case he would have died from the same drowning as the other boys, or the head injury?

For the record, I believe TH to be the guilty party in this and I believe he did the genital mutilation to make it look like a sex crime, which I don't believe it was.


Love your work on this case, thanks for such informative posts!

Like Cappuccino said, I'm sorry, but, unless you are a certified forensic pathologist, I'm afraid I'll have to take the words of the experts.

If the genital injury on Christopher was accomplished by a human, are you implying that the human bit off the genitals? If the genitals were removed by a human by using a knife or other sharp object, why was the shaft of the penis still intact? Also, if the penis was removed by a human, where is it? An animal would have eaten it, but a human would have discarded it (or kept it as a trophy). To my knowledge, the penis has not been found.

This is really gross, and I apologize in advance, but consider this: An animal (most probably an alligator snapping turtle) clamps down on the penis. The animal wouldn't really want to bite through the shaft, just suck off the meat (like how you eat a barbeque rib). The shaft (like the rib bone) remains, but the succulent tissue is removed.

 

[justthinkin]

I may have missed this somewhere, there is so much to read on this case, but didn't Christopher die due to bleed loss as the COD, rather than drowning? I assumed this was due to the genital damage, but if it was caused by animals, wouldn't that have been postmortem? In which case he would have died from the same drowning as the other boys, or the head injury?

For the record, I believe TH to be the guilty party in this and I believe he did the genital mutilation to make it look like a sex crime, which I don't believe it was.


Love your work on this case, thanks for such informative posts!

You are correct, mtnone. The autopsy did not confirm drowning in the case of Christopher Byers.
Dr. Spitz was forced to state that Christopher drowned if the wounds were inflicted by turtles as he said. Otherwise manner of death would have been conflicted with his other statement.

Am enclosing a video link to a baby snapping turtle eating a pinkie mouse. It's gross so if anyone doesn't want to watch, don't click on the video. What the video shows is that the turtle continues to bite and bite in one spot until he is able to bite completely through to get a morsel off, which he then eats. He tears at the thing with his claws, but only to get a better grasp to continue biting in that one spot before eating and moving onto another spot.

Over and over in the turtle world the tactics used by the baby snapping turtle are the same. Degloving by a turtle is just a preposterous thought to anyone who knows anything about reptiles.

Usually only the link comes up, but in this case the video came up, and I know we are no longer supposed to embed videos, IIRC. So go to Youtube, and enter this: Baby Snapping Turtle vs Pinky Mouse.

 

[BD1]

You are correct, mtnone. The autopsy did not confirm drowning in the case of Christopher Byers.
Dr. Spitz was forced to state that Christopher drowned if the wounds were inflicted by turtles as he said. Otherwise manner of death would have been conflicted with his other statement.

Am enclosing a video link to a baby snapping turtle eating a pinkie mouse. It's gross so if anyone doesn't want to watch, don't click on the video. What the video shows is that the turtle continues to bite and bite in one spot until he is able to bite completely through to get a morsel off, which he then eats. He tears at the thing with his claws, but only to get a better grasp to continue biting in that one spot before eating and moving onto another spot.

Over and over in the turtle world the tactics used by the baby snapping turtle are the same. Degloving by a turtle is just a preposterous thought to anyone who knows anything about reptiles.

Usually only the link comes up, but in this case the video came up, and I know we are no longer supposed to embed videos, IIRC. So go to Youtube, and enter this: Baby Snapping Turtle vs Pinky Mouse.

Yes to all of this. I have to say, predation by animals just doesn't seem to make sense to me, for two reasons. One, the cause of death wouldn't be bleeding to death. Two, how can it can be said on one hand that the degloving of the penis would take skill if done with a sharp instrument and a human hand, and on the other hand that it was most likely predators, who have no skill at all?

 

[Compassionate Reader]

Please remember that Peretti (who has not passed his certification exam) is the one who said that the genital injury exhibited skill. Therefore, I take that statement with a grain of salt. Although I disagree with Spitz about the dog theory, I believe that what those certified forensic pathologists said about the injuries is more accurate than Peretti. Although they disagreed in a few points, as real experts often do, they all agreed that all of the injuries (with the exception of the basilar skull fractures) were caused by animals, most likely postmortem.

As to Christopher dying of exsanguination as opposed to drowning, the official COD was multiple injuries, not blood loss.

http://callahan.8k.com/images/ascl/MENotice_Chris.JPG

I realize that multiple injuries could also cause blood loss, but the other two had multiple injuries listed as COD, too. The drowning was mentioned in the autopsy, but not on the official COD form.

http://callahan.8k.com/images/ascl/MENotice_Steve.JPG

http://callahan.8k.com/images/ascl/MENotice_Michael.JPG

If the genital mutilation occurred shortly before actual death, IMO it is possible for his blood to seep out, especially in water, to an extent to which exsanguination was considered as a possibility.

Consider this: drowning is difficult to prove according to what I have read. The amount of fluid in the boys' lungs and/or stomachs was hardly conclusive to a finding of death by drowning, which is why it was not listed as the official cause of death IMO. So, if they were rendered unconscious at the time of the initial attack, they could have aspirated enough fluid to make drowning a possibility.

Given Pererri's uncertain skills, IMO he was confused. They were found in water. Some fluid was present in the lungs. Hence, they drowned. IMO this is just indicative of his limited and questionable skills as a forensic pathologist and why he can't pass the certification exam.

 

[Livvy]

If Chris bled out in the water after an animal ate his penis then wouldn't the water be filled with blood? This didn't seem to be fast moving water.
Off to look to see how much blood Chris still had in his body at autopsy... You would think they measure that.

 

[Compassionate Reader]

If Chris bled out in the water after an animal ate his penis then wouldn't the water be filled with blood? This didn't seem to be fast moving water.
Off to look to see how much blood Chris still had in his body at autopsy... You would think they measure that.

You're correct in that the water in the ditch was near stagnant when the bodies were found. It could have been running slightly faster after a rain (which I believe occurred on May 4th), and that could account for the absence of blood. Or the actual degloving could have occurred in the manhole and the blood would have been there, which was never investigated.

 

[Pensfan]

Please remember that Peretti (who has not passed his certification exam)

Shortened for brevity.

Please cite a legitimate link that proves that Dr. Perretti did not pass his board certification exam. I have looked and cannot find evidence that he failed.

Dr. Peretti may have never taken his board certification exam. Many older doctors never took their board certifying exams because the exam is expensive, only offered in very specific locations (usually in the NE or Chicago) which requires money and time off work to reach the destination, it is NOT requirement to practice medicine, and it may not have increased their income if they did pass the expensive exam.

 

[Pensfan]

If Chris bled out in the water after an animal ate his penis then wouldn't the water be filled with blood? This didn't seem to be fast moving water.
Off to look to see how much blood Chris still had in his body at autopsy... You would think they measure that.

Even if the stream was moving slowly, realize that the boys were in the water at least since daybreak which means for 6+ hours. It is possible that they were in the water for a much longer time. LE did find that an area on the bank had been deliberately cleared. Jessie stated that water was splashed on the bank (which drained down the bank into the stream) to remove some of the blood.

 

[Cappuccino]

Even if the stream was moving slowly,

What stream? It was a muddy, 2 foot ditch, ffs.

realize that the boys were in the water at least since daybreak which means for 6+ hours.

Fine. So. Dr Perretti's evidence means pretty much nothing.

 

[Pensfan]

What stream? It was a muddy, 2 foot ditch, ffs.

Fine. So. Dr Perretti's evidence means pretty much nothing.

All the documents state they were submerged. One cannot be submerged in a shallow puddle. There had to be a sizable amount of water in that ditch or stream.

WM3 supporters "spun" Dr. Perretti's lack of board certification as though it proved him to be incompetent. His lack of board certification may mean absolutely nothing except that he is an older doc. Years ago, older docs were less inclined to spend money on a "piece of paper" that might not increase/impact their salary.

 

[Cappuccino]

It wasn't a stream, Pensfan. It was a stagnant, muddy ditch between 2 and 2 and a half foot deep. If you don't know that, then you know pretty much nothing about this case.
The children were pressed hard, face down into the mud at the bottom of the ditch.

I don't think you understood a word I said about Dr. Perretti. You certainly didn't respond to what I said - you just went off on some tangent of your own. Dr. Perretti testified that the time of death was between 1 am and 6 am on the morning of May 6th. That didn't suit the Prosecutors' theory of the crime, so they brought in another witness to undermine his TOD testimony. Depending on which of those witnesses you believe, if either, you have to revise your idea of how long the bodies were in the water.