CO - Gannon Stauch, 11, found deceased, Colorado Springs, El Paso County, 27 Jan 2020 *Arrest* #59

[Amster]

If I was H, I’d cut & color my hair so I wouldn’t look like L.

 

[Amster]

It wasn't there when they packed the first van, she retrieved it later when she "went out for dog food"

ahhhh….I see. Thanks

 

[Curious Me]

So, was it Aunt Brenda or her husband who worked for the Ford corporation? IIRC, that was where the corp discount for the hotel check-ins came with Letecia having the code and using that Ford corp code. Did the same Aunt get any deals for Harley's car too? Is she Letecia's sister? It's awful that Harley was constantly having to be manipulated to obey and not question, apparently from her mother and then Aunt Brenda.

Defense Attorney tried to make Harley feel bad or like a liar saying on the funding page she started that she had lost both parents at age 17. I hope Letecia got the message because it sounds like Harley was implying that Letecia is dead to her now. ​

 

[Kiranerys]

So, was it Aunt Brenda or her husband who worked for the Ford corporation? IIRC, that was where the corp discount for the hotel check-ins came with Letecia having the code and using that Ford corp code. Did the same Aunt get any deals for Harley's car too? Is she Letecia's sister? It's awful that Harley was constantly having to be manipulated to obey and not question, apparently from her mother and then Aunt Brenda.​

I think she is Letecia’s aunt.

 

[iamshadow21]

If I was H, I’d cut & color my hair so I wouldn’t look like L.

I resemble one of my abusers very strongly. The colour of my hair and eyes, the shape of my features, my skin tone. You learn to make your peace with seeing that looking back at you from the mirror every day. It doesn't matter if you dye your hair, cover things up with makeup or even surgery - you always know it's there, in your very DNA. You make your peace, preferably, if you're the parental type, before having kids of your own, because your kid could bear that resemblance, too, through no fault of their own. You need to process that garbage and accept it, because it doesn't go away. It's your body.

MOO

 

[arielilane]

Did LE not see a big bulky green suitcase in back of the van??
Does seem a tad unbelievable that HH never looked in the back of that van ever.

Like most teenagers she probably was looking at smartphone most of the time, or defendant distracted her. Defendant appears to need attention at all times. It's exhausting. imo

 

[Tealgrove]

Here’s my take.

I think Harley is stunningly beautiful. I do.

I don’t think Harley looks like Leticia.

Harley needs to own herself and her identity.

She did the right thing and she’s so very young. Great respect for Harley today.

I hope she is able to move forward and find a way to deal with her mother’s actions.

Do your thing Girl!

 

[heartandsoul]

HH is a victim, who was a child at the time. It sounds like she is only approx 5 months into unlearning her entire childhood. I’m sure if this trial had come a few years down the line, her testimony would be a little different. But it’s very raw for her. Of course our focus is, and everyone’s should be, entirely on Gannon, but I’m not surprised she had moments of sadness for herself as well. She is still so young, and she’s been through a lot.

I think we can afford to be kind to and gentle of her. She did the right thing for Gannon today and it can’t have been easy.

Another day closer to justice, G-man.

 

[Ontario Mom]

Wow, HH. She made me cry.
I hope her life going forward, is filled with all the best things God has to offer.

 

[Gut_feeling]

We could also ask why brother DL didn't call LE when he didn't have a good feeling about the suitcase defendant was trying to lift. moo

Absolutely, that really blew my mind when I heard that.

 

[Kingsley]

What a day. It provided a lot of context in my mind for a lot of the bits and pieces.
I think that it was important to the case and important to HH that she testify.
But ... I don't think she is a strong person. She has been unquestioning and manipulated all her life. While I think that the basic facts of what she said are true, I also think that as a highly suggestible person, that nuances of her memories can probably be shaped. That is my only reservation for today's testimony by HH. Unfortunately, the place where that potentially comes up is in her judgement of whether her mother could make rationale decisions and follow up those decisions with action. I'm not sure she would come to that conclusion (that LS was essentially sane) on her own without guidance because up until that point, she never seemed to look at anything her mother did objectively or analytically. To determine something like that, she would need to remove herself from the psychological box that she was in during the journey.
I'm probably not being clear. Sorry if not.
JMO.

 

[Marmlet]

One of the biggest revelations for me today, was the shopping list. No bleach, nothing to clean up blood. It made me realize that LS was lying to HH, too. She was just getting HH out of the house, and trying to further her candle story. No matter what she suspected or put together later, HH was not helping clean up a bloody crime scene.

I also know what it’s like to grow up afraid to cross your parent (ever, even mildly). And my mom was no LS, by any means. But I would still not cross her, even now at 49 years old.

I’ve always thought that even if HH did suspect, what was she going to do? Confront the woman who JUST KILLED SOMEONE?!? Even grown women with other adult support and the means to leave, have trouble confronting or reporting their abusers, for fear of retribution. There was no one to support or protect her if she defied her mom and things went bad. And she’d already proven that she was willing to kill.

 

[NuttMegg]

Did anyone else notice the defense guy was trying to imply that HH was an equal partner in deciding where they went each day on the trip? He would say, where did you decide to go, to stay, etc, as though LS hadn't been making the decisions.

 

[Walela]

Isn't that when T changed her plea to NGRI?

She changed her plea to NGRI in Feb of 2022. I haven't found anything about Nov 2022 yet.
Letecia Stauch changes plea, asks to waive jury trial

 

[steeltowngirl]

What a day. It provided a lot of context in my mind for a lot of the bits and pieces.
I think that it was important to the case and important to HH that she testify.
But ... I don't think she is a strong person. She has been unquestioning and manipulated all her life. While I think that the basic facts of what she said are true, I also think that as a highly suggestible person, that nuances of her memories can probably be shaped. That is my only reservation for today's testimony by HH. Unfortunately, the place where that potentially comes up is in her judgement of whether her mother could make rationale decisions and follow up those decisions with action. I'm not sure she would come to that conclusion (that LS was essentially sane) on her own without guidance because up until that point, she never seemed to look at anything her mother did objectively or analytically. To determine something like that, she would need to remove herself from the psychological box that she was in during the journey.
I'm probably not being clear. Sorry if not.
JMO.

Don’t be sorry. I know what you mean. I question whether HH would be able to truthfully determine what sane is. Especially legal sanity at the time of the murder. For that matter, how does a jury even truly know?

If I’m understanding NGRI correctly, it doesn’t matter if Tee is competent now, or if she was competent prior to the murder. It’s what her state of mind was when she murdered Gannon. Getting the determination right is the difference between justice for Gannon or mercy for an insane killer. That’s a tall order to fill for a jury to determine, let alone the killer’s daughter.

I hope they get it right.

jmo

 

[Pianoturtle]

All I am saying is the B.S she was talking about her watchful alertness does not show itself in the story she was telling and definitely doesn't transpose well with the events that happened.

I took the comment from Det Bethel to mean that she can see TS eyeballing the gun when she watches the video. Not that she noticed in the moment. She was sitting in front of TS. She wouldn’t have had eyes on her.

 

[iamshadow21]

HH is a victim, who was a child at the time. It sounds like she is only approx 5 months into unlearning her entire childhood. I’m sure if this trial had come a few years down the line, her testimony would be a little different. But it’s very raw for her. Of course our focus is, and everyone’s should be, entirely on Gannon, but I’m not surprised she had moments of sadness for herself as well. She is still so young, and she’s been through a lot.

I think we can afford to be kind to and gentle of her. She did the right thing for Gannon today and it can’t have been easy.

Another day closer to justice, G-man.

It takes years for adults who have been in abusive relationships with coercive control to untangle their thinking. She was a literal child with no foundational years of healthy relationships to fall back on. She's just beginning to find her way out of the weeds, work out who she is as a person. Who am I, what do I think, what do I like, what do I dislike. Her whole life till now has been about being an extension of LS. Everything was about LS's wants, needs, moods, desires. Stopping that ride, stepping off...it's like having been spinning your whole life, and you stop, but the world's still whirling around you.

MOO

 

[sunflowerchick]

Yup. You are right.

What did I miss? When did she change her plea?

 

[Pianoturtle]

1) I don’t think there was any bombshells in HH’s testimony. Seems she was taught not to question her mother and chaos and unpredictability was standard.

2) I know neither TS or HH seems to know the Springs area very well. It’s not uncommon given they lived on the south side and probably frequented the Powers corridor most. But I find it real rich TS telling HH she got lost buying dog food when she left the hotel for two hours. That hotel is like 5 minutes from the much mentioned Petco.

 

[Love Never Fails]

Who is Laina?

GS daughter.