Sword and Scale - Episode 116

Episode Date: June 4, 2018

On Sunday, October 4th 2009, Milford Police Sgt. Kevin Furlong was dispatched by 911 to 4 Trow Road in Mont Vernon. There had been a home invasion. Inside he found Jaimie Cates with multiple stab wounds and injuries and the body of her mom Kimberly Cates with numerous slashing and stab marks. Who would have done such a thing to this poor family?See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence and is not intended for all audiences Listener discretion is advised I remember someone started screaming and At one point I heard like us and then some of the screaming stopped. This is Sword and Scale, episode 116, a show that reveals that the worst monsters are real. Hey, don't let the music fool you. We got a bad one coming. I mean probably not of the stirring the mom brains variety, but still pretty bad. You see, a lot of the stories we tell here are pretty predictable.

There's a lot of lovers quarrels or issues with money or just some sort of extreme mental illness that's been untreated. This one is arguably much more horrifying because it's like there's none of those things. It's just a random, senseless, incredibly violent act. Well, let me not give away the story. Listen for yourself.

And hopefully you're not alone tonight. We've all heard the statistics before. We know that the vast majority of murder victims have some sort of connection to their killers. Maybe it's a coworker, an ex-lover, a relative, or a spouse. These are the stories that we've become accustomed to hearing. But what about the rest? What about the small percentage of murders carried out at the hands of strangers, cases in which a killer takes another life, not out of anger, passion, or revenge, but simply for the thrill of Saturday, October 3, 2009, 42-year-old Kimberly Kates was home alone with her 11-year-old daughter, Jamie. David Kates, Kim's husband and Jamie's father, was Her name is Jamie Kates. It is.

You see your only child? She is. How old is Jamie now? Jamie's 12. How old was she back in October of 2009? She was 11. Who is Jamie's mother? Kimberly. Kates.

Their home was tucked away in the thick forest of Mont Vernon, New Hampshire. Although it was only a couple of miles from town, the Cates home was almost completely secluded, situated on a quiet half mile long dirt road that was lined with tall trees on both sides. You might be familiar with Mount Vernon, Virginia, the birthplace of George Washington. Or maybe you live next to some other city called Mount Vernon, of which there are many. But you've probably never heard of Mount Vernon, New Hampshire. Mount Vernon is a small town with a population of around 2400. It's the kind of place where everyone knows everyone, and up until 2009, community members

felt like Montvernan was immune to the types of crime and violence that affected larger towns and cities. Many locals didn't even feel the need to lock their doors at night. Kim and David Kates, having lived in Tucson and Baltimore before settling down in Montvernan, weren't quite as trusting as some of their neighbors. They preferred to keep their doors locked. Did you have an alarm system in your home back in October of 2009? There was one in the house.

Yes. Is that something that you and your wife ever used? We used it for a very brief period of time two or three years ago Basically, there was a short in the system and we couldn't get it working Was it working in October 2000 or not? It was not According to the Boston Globe, Kim had made a pact with her next door neighbor to keep an eye out for each other That neighbor would later state We always thought that if anything happened we'd hear because we're right next door neighbor to keep an eye out for each other. That neighbor would later state, we always thought that if anything happened, we'd hear

because we're right next door. But on that Saturday night, Kim's neighbor didn't hear a thing. When you were away, was it unusual for Kim and Jamie to sleep in the same room together? Not unusual at all. What room would they typically sleep in together? In the master bedroom. That was the room we saw with that sliding box. It was. unusual at all. Sometime after checking in with David, Kim and Jamie fell asleep together in the master bedroom.

At some point during the night, Kim woke up by the sound of someone moving around inside the home. She sat up and said, Jamie, is that you? Shortly after 4 a.m. on Sunday, October 4th, Milford Police Sergeant David Furlong was dispatched to the Cates Residence on Trow Road. The Milford Area Communications Center had received a 911 call, because they were unable to establish communication with the caller, the call was dispatched as a possible home invasion.

Sergeant Furlong called a partner for backup as it was unclear whether or not the home invasion was still in progress. But he was the first officer to arrive at the house on Trow Road. Sergeant Furlong parked, got out of his vehicle and walked towards the residence. He would later report the following. I backed my cruiser up and exited in order to approach the house with no light. I hurried to the left side of the driveway and attempted to look through the front window. The front window is a series of windows showing the kitchen. This is the window that was lit up from inside. There is a small evergreen tree

near the window, and the tree was on my left as I looked inside. As I looked inside, I saw a child lift her head from behind the counter. I observed that her head was completely drenched in blood, but was moving side to side. I immediately radioed that I observed lots of blood and needed an ambulance immediately. I stated I would be gaining entry to the house. I tried the front door and found it to be locked. I announced Milford Police Department and then attempted to kick the door in two times while announcing myself, but it did not move at all. I then shouldered the door

and heard the door frame crack. I then shouldered the door again and gained access to the home. Immediately after going through the door, I observed a young female to my left. That young female was 11-year-old Jamie Cates. I observed the little girl laying on the floor, basically in a pool of blood. Did you go off the moon girl? Yeah, I observed that she was trying to yell, however, nothing was coming out. As Sergeant for a long approached Jamie, he could see that she was severely injured. Just numerous, numerous last-terrations to her face, her extremities. I observed that she was barefoot.

I observed that part of her foot was completely missing. I observed that another part of her foot was just barely connected. Sergeant Furlong finally got close enough to make out what Jamie was trying to say to him. Laceration running from her cheek down to her neck prevented her from speaking above a whisper. I got close to her. I told her that I was a police officer. I was there to help. She then set in a whisper while shaping shaking that she thought her mommy was dead. Sergeant Furlong carried Jamie outside and re-entered the house. He would later report the following. I then re-entered the home with my flashlight and firearm drawn.

I was looking for additional victims as well as suspects. I took a right and traveled down the hallway announcing my presence. I continued to see blood on the floor. I approached a large bedroom at the end of the hallway. Upon entering the room, I saw a sliding glass door to my left had been shattered, and there was a piece of furniture through it. I searched the room and checked the bed. Upon approaching the bed, I observed a female lying on her back with her head near the

headboard. I observed that she was nude below the waist. I continued to announce myself and approached her head while still scanning my surroundings. I observed that she had major trauma on her head and she was deceased. So she died as a result of these multiple sharp injuries that affected her head, her neck, her torso, her left arm, and her left leg. So to be clear, it wasn't just one wound and the kilpkin case, it was a combination of many wounds. Many wounds, I mean obviously some are very superficial and if she had only sustained those, then she would have survived. But there are several that are appropriating vital organs,

transacting and severing major vessels that would have contributed to this loss of blood and loss of organ function. Again for the record, probably a wound is taken out on the body. 32 and all. Would you allow for every single wound? Yes. Every single one can go out. They are all causing what's called a vital reaction.

So bleeding and the tissues surrounding the wound, internal bleeding. They look very different from the wounds I make. When I do a post-mortem examination, I use a scalpel. I don't see the same tissue reaction when I make my incisions. She was alive the whole time. Yes. Meanwhile, Officer Eric Wales had arrived on scene. Officer Wales would later report the following.

I parked and could see that the front door had been broken open. I immediately ran across the lawn toward the broken front door. As I approached, I noticed a young girl sitting upright with her legs crossed, on the walkway by the floor. I noticed that she had several large lacerations throughout her body. I radioed Sergeant Furlong with my findings, and he told me to stay with her and give any medical treatment that I could. I looked over her body for the most severe injury and noticed. A golf ball-sized laceration on her head.

Laceration that went from about her left ear to her left shoulder. Laceration on her right inner thigh that went from front to back. The inside of her foot appeared to be shaved off, and what appeared to be her big toe was pointing towards her heel, and appeared to be detached by a small thread of skin. None of the elasteration's appeared to be bleeding out at this time, so I placed Gaw's pads over her foot and began speaking with her. I asked her what her name was and she said Jamie. I told her that I was going to be taken care of her until the ambulance arrived. I asked her how this happened and she said that those guys in the house, one of them had a knife and the other one had a bat and he hit my mom. The weapon that appeared to Jamie to be a baseball bat would actually turn out to be a machete. While the intruders continued attacking her mom, Jamie lay on the floor pretending to be dead

so that they wouldn't hit her again. I'd asked her why they were there and she told me that she heard one of them say get the jewelry. An ambulance arrived and Jamie was rushed to the hospital. She had been stabbed and hacked from head to toe. Her skull and elbow were fractured, her lung was punctured, and her big toe had to be amputated. A senior pediatric surgeon at Boston Children's Hospital would later state that in over two decades of practice, he

had never treated a child with so many stab and slash wounds. But somehow, Jamie survived. It doesn't appear that her injuries are life threatening, but that isn't by any means to minimize the severity of the attack on her as well. At some point on the morning of the attack, state troopers contacted David Kates to tell him that his wife had been killed and that his daughter was in the hospital. How did you find out that weekend that Kim and Jamie had been attacked in your home? I got a phone call from the state troopers on Sunday morning. What did you do once you got that phone call? I immediately changed my flight and came home.

When you got home, did you get more details about what happened to Kim and Jamie? Actually, in the airport, while I was waiting on my flight, I got some more details about what occurred. Investigators were already trying to piece together a possible motive for the attack. At some point afterwards, when you told that some items have been taken from your home during the attack on your wife and daughter, did someone from the state police come to you show you items and ask if you could identify them? Yes. By definition, this was a burglary, but this was not an ordinary burglary.

The sheer level of violence discovered at the crime scene suggested to investigators that theft was not the only motive. That Jamie and Kim were not viciously attacked over a mere handful of jewelry. It was clear that whoever broke into their home that night was prepared to kill anyone who might be inside. In the days following the murder, 17-year-old Stephen Spader, 19-year-old Christopher Grimmel, 18-year-old Billy Marx, and 17-year-old Quinn Glover, would be placed under arrest and connection with the home invasion and murder.

Prior to the arrest, Christopher Grimmel, who goes by Chris, had participated in a marathon interrogation that lasted more than seven hours. a little bit. My dad being an auntie, that could mean anything from she's in a coma, but she's not going to die to, she's up awake and perfectly happy to go lucky. So far, I know they got into a car accident when you're looking for a car, but assuming that somebody specifically tried to kill them, like that rubs against against my conscience personally, and one of those type of German-speaking chivalry sort of guys that you don't even kid girls that long go out and treat them badly. And if the girls in the hospital obviously you probably got injured or something. Well, so, this is quite a good match map because a lot want to let you know she is going to survive

Fortunately, that's good. Yeah, that is real good because It's it's real good because she deserves to be alive. It's sort of yeah, sort of thought maybe I'm sure Now, but you know what else is good. It's good because she could idea the two people that It's good because she can idea the two people that never be without us. Don't be awesome, I hope you guys can do that. Chris lived in Brookline, New Hampshire, which is about a 20-minute drive south of Case Home in Mont Vernon. On the afternoon of Monday, October 5th, state troopers John and Carnasio and Jeff Ardini had found Chris hanging out at the home

of his friend Steven Spader. The boys reportedly told the state troopers that they were about to go find some job applications. This was curious to the troopers because Chris was dressed in camouflage and carrying four pocket knives. Chris handed over his knives and voluntarily agreed to participate in an interview at the state police barracks in Milford. And for getting for extraulating here, but I always try to analyze that's okay. So I'm assuming they were in the house when they were attacked. What do you think they were doing? No, I'm not good.

You're talking Saturday night, so they were probably watching TV or something. Maybe hanging out doing stuff. No, I mean, what do you think the two people were doing? I don't know It's possible they were it was like a robbery come wrong I guess If you know if it let's say it was a robbery gone wrong and Mom has a debt

Little girl has a seriously injured with people involved in it. Then after you had nasty people, what do you think should happen to those people? Well, they should probably get sent to jail for the rest of the lives of an effrism. I honestly don't know what's the difference between jail and prison. Do you think that should be a death penalty case? I honestly don't know the politics on the death penalty in the album. Not at all.

Because what you say, I don't know if we have the death penalty. You're just going to put up one of us and then what can't happen and what he'd like to see happen could be two different things. Well, I'm asking, what do you think would be fair to say that these two people walked in the house and killed them and injured a little girl? What do you think should happen? What's your opinion? Assuming that they intentionally attacked them when they were robbing the house, also assuming that the robbing the house didn't just go in there to kill them. I would say they should probably at least go to prison for the rest of their lives.

The jury said to the death penalty yesterday, I probably wouldn't disagree with that, because it really goes against me. It's a harm of women in general, from a little girl, and from what I understanding she's about 10 years old. She's a lot of money. So that's like, how could you do that to someone like him? Oh, I agree. He insists that he had nothing to do with the attack in Mont Vernon. Undeterred, the interrogators start to apply pressure, bringing his friend Stephen Spader into the equation. and deal with the consequences later. I would definitely stop. And because I don't put up with stuff from anyone to a certain degree. If he's going to smoke cigarettes and he's almost 18, I don't care. We're not talking smoke cigarettes.

Oh, yeah. We're not talking drinking beer if you're under eight. Yeah, I'm just using the hot and serious stuff. Chris, you don't get it, do you? You're a very smart person. You sit and hear and talk to us. I'm looking at you and listening to what's coming out of your mouth. You're very smart and intelligent person.

But I don't think you really get the big picture. You were here for a reason, OK? You were sitting there, minimizing things, talking about smoking cigarettes. We're talking about a homicide here. There is a dead woman, and there is a little girl that has been seriously injured, and you're talking about cigarettes. You want to know what the other guys are talking about? They're not talking about cigarettes. You want to know what the other guys are talking about? They're not talking about cigarettes. So you've got to start thinking really hard

and pull your head out of your behind and start telling us what happened on Saturday night because it's not looking very good for you. Right now, there is a train coming down the track and you are on the track. Do you see where I'm going with that? Your story, your story doesn't fit. Your buddies are telling us something different. People are talking about something different than what you are telling us. This was Saturday night. This wasn't three months

ago Saturday night. This was Saturday night. It is one day right now. There should be no question in your mind what you did. You just called us, you don't use drugs. You don't drink. You have no reason to have this merry loss. I just don't put anything into long-term memory unless, it's a let's take a deep breath and think long and hard about what happened Saturday night. You guys are parked over there, but stop from there. What happens?

happens. You cruise off. You cruise off and that's the story you want to leave here with. And that's the story that you expect Jeff and I to believe. Guys who have been investigating on our sides who are 15, 16, 17 years in law enforcement. You've watched CSI. You know how that stuff works. You've watched the police shows how we talk to different people, we talk to different suspects and we bring people in and one person says something, a little something, another person says a little something, different people say different things and we put our case together, you want to go down like that. Well, I can't tell you anything but what I think I did.

What you think you did, don't tell me what you think you did. Tell me what you did. Okay? Be a man and tell me what you did. For hours, Christa Nyes being at the Kate's home on the night of the attack, claiming that he was just driving around having fun with his friends. The interrogators tell Chris that his friends were telling them a different story. In response, Chris eventually says, if you had evidence, you'd be arresting me right now. If you really had something from them, that's enough to charge me, and you're not arresting me.

So I think you're bullshitting me and telling me that my friends are ratting me out. But as the interview continues, Chris starts to worry that investigators might actually have some solid evidence against him. Some of them had kind of queued me into somebody who's saying something. They had mentioned things that set me off. There's some things you can infer from a crime scene that I could tell they could infer from it. There are some things that I knew were lies that I heard them say. And there were other things that hit way too close to the mark that they couldn't know without somebody saying something. Like how Billy had not been able to get out of the basement. That's something you can't infer from the crime scene,

to my mind. There were other things they mentioned, something about, did we go out and bury something? That specifically hit me, and I was thinking about that while John was walking around the room during that break, because, as I remember, it only me and Steve knew that we buried the weapons, and if he was saying things, then they could

have everything. So, it didn't really matter at that point. I was like, hmm, what's the give me the death penalty? Then I'll just be dead and this all I'll be over with anyway. So, be like killing myself. So at that point I was kind of like, no, John, why don't you get your tape recorder? And he came back in. He was all excited. I brought tape recorder back in and that's when I told them exactly what happened. And pretty much the same way I told you here. I mean he asked a bunch

of questions about specific details that he wanted to go back over and just pretty much laid out everything that happened for him. He's in L.E. and Christian did a great 101889. Trooper and Carnasio reads Chris, his Miranda rights again, and then they get started. And again, just for the main reason that it was conspiracy. Okay. Stephen and I are very similar. Stephen Spader. Both of us grew up with problems in our families.

Technically we're both sociopaths, legally, by neuropsychologists' declaration. There should be a paper in the scripture case in the top black, top drawer, or a black dresser that says as much. Okay. If it's not there, my father knows where it is. He took it to the council and said, or that I was to go to today. Okay. I do not use that as an excuse. I just thought I'd like to know that's important. Steve and I have been friends for a very long time. Chris tells the interrogators that he'd lost touch with Steve for a while, and that they'd

recently become reacquainted through the Eagle Scouts. Leading up to the night of the Mont Vernon attack, Chris claims that they had been committing burglaries together on a regular basis. Within the past week or so, we've been in the past three weeks. We've been kinda desperate for cash and made it up around the house next day because I knew them. They kind of messed up my life all along before I hadn't really didn't care. And so we waited until they were at church and I fussed it in the back door.

We went around, grabbed some stuff and I paused some joy. Most of the joy ended up being fake. I ended up selling a silver bracelet and a couple silver rings that cash were going to place at the mall, okay? In addition to that, Steve and I ended up taking some joy from this mall, who in all fairness, they said they were going to pay me gas mine to drag me to school

and then she changed her mind, okay? And so, it was probably, you know, it was wrong, but I felt a little vindicated by it. And this sold some perpetually to the pawn shop in Milford. However, that a few days ago, we decided that we were so low on cash, we couldn't manage to get jobs, and we were gonna try and get another robbery, but we're actually gonna break down another person's house. We weren't sure when or how we were gonna do it. Saturday morning, when I was with Steve, I'd already planned on being like off from that evening at her brother's birthday party and so on. He told me that human Billy had been cruising around and it found a house at Mount Vernon that looked reasonable enough that it was at the middle of nowhere.

After he told Chris that he and Billy had picked out a house to target in Mount Vernon, Steve let Chris know that this wasn't just going to be another burglary. He said, yeah, we're just going to go in there, grab some stuff, if anybody's there, we're going to kill them, have some fun. Chris didn't have any complaints about Steve's plan to, in his words, go in there, grab some stuff, and if anybody's in there, kill them, have some fun. I agreed. You do that, that sounded good. And he said, well, he would text me, but we couldn't meet.

The Walmart, at our midnight, that night, we'd go on to it. OK. Billy was in our tube. He was off work. We all had parking hours. I had found a machete that my father owned. And Steve had mentioned he liked machetes, so I brought it along. And there's a boy scout knife, a straight knife, four or five inches long, okay, thin blade. I liked it and a very nice handle and it had a leather case that could

go on the belt. So I chose that and he met up, Queen Queen was going to be on it, he'd on it too. Chris and Steve met up with their friends, Billy Marks and Queen Glover, before driving out to the house they decided to target. A fifth friend, 19-year-old Autumn Savoy, had allegedly agreed to provide an alibi for the group if needed. Autumn was going to be our cover story.

He said, we get there. Whatever we told him, he'd say we were there. an alibi for the group if needed. to the one where the homes are too blessed. It's very large. We were, no way we're gonna be able to do this. Okay. We chose the other house. Didn't look like anybody was really home. Right? We figured it would be easy. Okay. Keep in mind, it was already well after midnight.

Meaning it wouldn't have been easy to tell if anyone was home. It seems more likely that they simply didn't care whether anyone was home. Okay, will you buy yourself? I'll buy it. I dropped up the road to meet them. We threw the other houses driveway and started crossing the backyard. Army called up towards the house. We waited for them to get there for the ones. We looked around for a good entry point.

I mean, we make a lot of noise. We didn't see any alarm systems. We figured we'd probably set. All the doors were locked. We finally found one basement window. We thought we could get billion to if I could get it open. I used the black mechanical assist knife that I had to cut the screens. There were two screens between us and the window. And I tried to cut the frame out of the window, but I ended up breaking the glass.

Only the first pane of glass there were two, which when I basically bashed in the window, not the glass, but I managed to break it off of the handle, the handle was on top of the end. We couldn't get anyone else in any other way, so far, and so we started sliding Billion. Billy was the smallest of the four, so they had him slide in through the window first, with the idea that he would open a door and let the other three in. Billy got in and was retarded because he went over to the basement door and thought it was locked because he pushed on it instead of pulling.

And so he was stuck in the basement and they were trying to get him out. Steve had the idea that we could take the air conditioner out. Okay. So I cut the panels off from around the side and we moved the air conditioner over. Steve went in, I helped him get in, hold the speed up as he called in, went around the open door. Then which door did you open? Back door. So red one, Oh, I'm a screen porch. OK. Steve had a machete the whole time. We liked it. It was cool.

And we started looking around. I found the box of other breakers in it. By the front door and close off other breakers. So there wouldn't be any power. OK. We caught Billy out of basement. found out that he was retarded and brought him up. There were motion detectors around. We weren't sure if we'd set up the alarm or not.

That's what we tried to be fast. Yeah. We looked around, always found, other than the master bedroom door being closed, was that there was an iPod and one of the girls was going to grab that. Still unsure as to whether or not anyone was home, the group continued searching the house, using the iPod as a flashlight. We went towards Master Bedroom, using the iPod as a light.

Steve had the machete I had, the voice got my phone. Steve was in the front, I was right behind him, swimming Billymore in there. OK. Small for you, would be able to have a tour Stephen was in the front, I was right behind him. Hitting Billy Miranda. All four of us were together at the entire time. When Stephen opened the master bedroom door quietly, he looked in and he said that there are people, but we thought he said there's no people. So he started to get a little bit relaxed and started talking, starting to quiet as down, and then he started to light on the bed and that's when they woke up. During the early morning hours of October 4, 2009, Chris Gibble and Stephen Spader, along

with their friends Billy Marks and Quinn Glover, broke into a random home in Mont Vernon. They switched off all the breakers and began to search the house. When Steve shined an iPod in the master bedroom, Kim Kates and her daughter Jamie woke up. Instead of fleeing the scene, Chris and Steve went into the room. Chris armed with a knife and Steve armed with a machete. Quinn stood outside the bedroom door, listening. Did you hear any noises? Yes, sir, I did. What noises did you hear coming from that bedroom?

At first, a voice said, the Jamie is at you. Then a response of a higher pitched voice said, yeah, mom. After that, there were screams, cries for help. What other noises did you hear, Mr. Glover? I heard footfalls and thuds. Billy remained outside the bedroom as well, watching. You stood in that doorway.

You watched them blow up the tackless people. Yes. Did you once just once try and stop? No. Trying to help him or her journey once. No. During his taped confession the next day, Chris would provide the following account of what took place inside the bedroom. But I heard him hit them all and so I dove in and stabbed her a few times in the chest, only two or three.

That pretty shows three. She started gurgling. Steve was just hacking away, he totally lost it. I was controlled, but I didn't really feel much of anything. I thought I would, but I didn't really feel much of anything. Yep. I thought I would, but I didn't. Over at Quinn and Billy Dover. They stayed by the door. They didn't do anything.

Oh, honestly. We did everything. The girl jumped up. I was so in the dark, get up. And jumped over her mother. And Steve was hacking away, and she jumped right into my arms. I stabbed her once. Towards the face, I hit bone, and I felt the knife skip off and didn't go in.

Then I went for the front. I stabbed her, so we're on the front right chest area. I tried to twist her around so I could get a better shot at her heart. It was automatic. I didn't even think about it. I just automatically did it. I stabbed her a couple times in the back as I was swinging around. She got free of my hand and I'm flying into the glass door. I knocked her head.

Stop crying completely. I figured she was probably toast. The mom was still gargling and kind of breathing deeply. Steve just went at it. So mom was still gargling and kind of breathing deeply. Steve just just went at it. I was actually kind of scared of him. He just kept hacking at the vent, came over it off our side and hacked out it some more. And then when I went over and kicked the girl a couple times with the steel toe boots,

and then hit her in the head with the machete. At least that's what they said it in for that. I was backing off because I knew Steve was losing. I could tell. Then he turned around and looked like Jason from Halloween with the machete. And I told him Steve for a while, it's Chris. He was bringing itiring in the lives. And Clint had the good sense to go turn the breakfast back on in the lights on him. Yeah. The mom is obviously not gonna make it.

The girl I was pretty sure wasn't going to. She was completely out there, but all of it applies. There's at least one slash across the mom's face down from the top left to the bottom right, where I could see right Dented her skull with the machete and I was keying out almost Steve Hector a couple more times after that and three plank over but you're still breathing Sion went over and stabbed inside of the neck and made sure her artery

Not a lot came out so I figured she was probably gone I her artery blood out. Not a lot came out so I figured she was probably gone. I think it's three statuos to the girl who probably had her gone anyway so I can't bother checking her. According to Quinn, when Steve and Chris exited the room, Steve told him that he thought the mother and daughter were dead. He said that we made enough noise because it's two people are dead. He said that two people were dead? Yes, sir. And that's after he came out of the bedroom. Again, how was that machete? It was covered in blood and hair.

Based on what he had witnessed, Billy also believed that both Kim and Jamie had been killed. Did you think that those two people, that woman and that little girl were alive and dead at that point on? I thought they were dead. What did you all do in the room after that was done? We started looking for stuff to take, stuff to steal. Yes. And you are that? Yes.

What was looking around that room, stuff to steal? It was Chris Gribble and me. What were you guys doing? We were looking through drawers, looking through, looking through whatever. Do you re-box this? Yes. Looking for stuff to steal. Yes.

You asked to do anything during that process? Yes. What were you asked to do? I was asked to find a magnet. A magnet? Yes. What for? To see what was going on, what wasn't?

I told you to do that. Chris Gribble? You did what he said. Yes. You'll get the magnet? Yes. What you got it from? Not the fridge.

What you give it to? I give it to Chris Gribble. Did you help him look for jewelry? Yes. Chris estimates that the group had spent about 20 to 30 minutes in the home before leaving. We grabbed just what drove him to find in our hay frite. Pretty much. We'd go out and hug you out.

We went back out the same way. Afterwards, Steve said that on some wall by the door he cut dye into the wall with the machete. The group drove away and placed their bloody clothes into a trash bag. Chris and Steve dropped Quinn and Billy off and then went over to their friend Autumn's house to make sure he was still willing to provide an alibi. Autumn was ready to get to the alibi and so he crashed at his place. That's 630. Autumn got up. We were going to burn everything, but got the great idea to throw the trash bag into the... not sure. We drove down on depot road just down the road where there's

a slight entrance where there's a bar covering it. I carried the bag. We made 10 long ways down the trail and tossed him there ever. I didn't throw all of the evidence into the Nashua River. They saved the knife and the machete used in the attack, burying them somewhere out in the woods. Once Chris' interrogation was over, he led investigators to the location of the murder weapons. While walking back in the woods, Chris asks one of the troopers how Jamie was doing. We don't want to ask him what kind of conditions to go in. Like is she away from OK here in the home of our family today? I'm just curious to see how she's doing.

I kind of feel like now that I hope she gets better. She's going to get better. We put it all behind her. A lot of injuries, a lot of surgery. She'll get better. That's good. None of the young men involved in the attack had any connection to the Kate's family whatsoever. The home had been chosen completely at random.

Usually this would make for a difficult investigation. In this case, however, the criminals made it awfully easy to track them down. The day after the murder, Chris and Steve had told one of their friends Kyle Fenton about the attack. After they left, Kyle looked online for news of any local murders. When he came across an article about the attack in Mont Vernon, he told his mother of what Chris and Steve had told him, and his mother contacted the police. Within 48 hours of the attack, Chris, Steve, Billy, and Quinn were all arrested. Quinn eventually pleaded guilty to charges of

burglary conspiracy to commit burglary and armed robbery. He was sentenced to between 20 and 40 years in prison. Billy pleaded guilty to charges of burglary, first degree assault, and conspiracy to commit murder. He was sentenced to between 30 and 60 years. On November 18th, autumn Savoy was also placed under arrest and charged with multiple counts of hindering apprehension. He was eventually sentenced to between 5 and 12 years in prison. Chris and Steve were each charged with attempted murder, first degree murder, and conspiracy to commit first degree murder. Billy Quinn and Autumn all agreed to testify against them at trial. Steve's trial began in October of 2010.

The prosecution alleged that Steve was the leader of the group, which Steve himself had named the Disciples of Destruction. According to court documents, Steve referred to the Disciples of Destruction as D.O.D. On the day of the attack, he had texted Quinn writing, it's Stevie, you gotta get out soon cause we ready. We need the completion of DOD to go on. On the way out to Mont Vernon, Steve allegedly told the other members of the group that the attack at the Kate's residence was going to be a form of initiation. After waiting his trial, Steve wrote the following in a letter to a fellow inmate. So Billy Chris and Quinn knew that I've been about bodies, so all three wanted to kill someone.

Personally, I was considering starting a crew, not a gang, but a group of like-minded individuals, with the balls to do crazy shit. I didn't want pussies, or people who just talk the talk, dig. So I set this up to see if my homies could be about it. I guess I thought wrong. At Steve's trial, Autumn's a boy who had supposedly declined an offer to be an official member of the disciples of destruction testified about his encounter with Steve the morning after the murder. And what happened when you saw the defendant?

I told them where to park and they parked there and then the defendant got out of the car and we started talking. And what did the defendant say? that he was dancing and jumping around between different conversations. But he had said that he had killed two people. So you said he was bouncy? Yes. Could you explain what do you mean by that? He was very up, is the best way I can describe it. Very happy, excited, and adrenaline rush.

And what did he tell you? he had killed two people? What about the defendant and Chris, were they saying how they were scared? Not at all. The opposite. Yeah, it was complete opposite. From what the defendant and Chris were talking about, did they appear to think that they had killed both of the victims? Yes they did. From the conversation was the power off the whole time? The whole time that Stevie was supposed to reach off and get the bed and they were actually doing anything in the house the power was supposedly off. After that, after they had thought that both victims were dead, Chris said that he went and turned the power back on.

Did the defendant say how the bedroom looked after the power was turned on? He said that it looked like a Halloween movie. Another friend of theirs, Eldon Spikes, testified that Steve had also bragged to him about the murder. What kinds of things were the defendant's say? Was it a defendant's say? What they had done, like, how happy they were doing it, and they were also planning to do it again. Just to give you an idea of the friend group we're dealing with, a few months after the trial, Eldon spikes would be charged with burglary in an unrelated incident.

A couple of years later, Kyle Fetton would be arrested and charged with the sexual assault of two fourteen and fifteen-year-old girls. It turns out that the disciples of destruction don't associate with particularly wholesome characters, shocking, I know. On October 28th, Quinn Glover told the jury that, leading up to the home invasion, Steve had grown obsessed with violence and murder. I'm sorry, Mr. Glover.

Can you again go over some of the things that the defendant was talking about he wanted to do? Breaking into houses, and he talked about eating people, roasting people, putting heads on stakes, making scenes for the press it was Did he ever use the term sleeping over he did sir, and what did you take that to mean sleeping over people's houses? Staying over the night with the bodies making a scene Doing things like eating Did he talk about breaking into homes just to kill people? No

What else did he want to do when he broke into homes Take valuables money jewelry anything to make money Who was the defendant talking to when he talked about breaking into homes killing people stealing stuff from the homes He was talking to myself Billing marks Chris Cribble. In the days leading up to what happened in Mob Vernon, did he continue to talk about killing people, murdering people, the defendant?

They became more prevalent actually. They became what? More prevalent. So they became more frequent? Yes. What about the intensity of what he was saying? Yes, they got more and more intense until it was actually talking about going into homes generally and doing all the things I said.

On November 9th, 2010, Steve's 19th birthday, The jury was set to announce their verdict. Prior to the verdict being read, Steve turned to one of his attorneys and asked if he thought the jury would sing happy birthday to him. They didn't. Mr. Spader, please remain standing and face the jury with the four persons please stand. Madam four person has the jury reached verdicts in these cases. Yes, we have. And how say you, Madame Four Prison, how do you find the defendant's teammate spader in indictment 2010, 241, charging purposeful first-degree murder, guilty or not guilty? Guilty.

You say Madame Four Prison that the verdict is guilty, so say you all ladies and gentlemen. Steve was found guilty on all charges. The prosecution requested a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole. Judge Gillian Abramson agreed to that request. I get the line for days and days and days about the death of your sexuality, but it is sufficient to say that you belong in a cage. For that reason, I am sentencing you with secondly to the maximum penalties which apply to your remaining convictions to ensure that you stay in that cage for the rest of your pointless life."

Chris Gribble's case went to trial the following March. Chris pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. I'm not legally insane. I'm saying it's my defense, yes. Do you not believe in your defense? I do believe in my defense. You're saying you were legally insane? Yes. On March 14, 2011, Chris took the stand. You're a dangerous guy, right? I could be considered dangerous, yes. You actually told Dr. Irvtime is about a month ago that the people in the jail have no idea how dangerous you are.

No, they don't. Is that one of those times when you did that smile, is that one of those times when you can kind of fake your body language? No, that it. No, I smile because it's funny that all the people in there have no idea who they're messing with. Riss admitted to his involvement in the attack and walked the jury through what happened from his perspective. I remember someone started screaming and at one point I heard like a... and then some of the screaming stopped and not long after that I kind of reached in and stabbed at the foreman for me. I knew what I was stabbing at, but I can't tell

you how, because I couldn't really see well, but I knew where it was. I can't explain how I even actually hit what I was stabbing at. Were you stabbing the person at the same time that Steve was hacking? Oh, he never stopped. He just kept going and going and going. It's not like he stopped in between. I just reached in. So you were doing it at the same time that he was hacking with him? Yes. Chris was also open about what he thought would happen

if he were ever allowed to reenter society. Now, I know that it is a possibility that legally it is possible if I were sent to the Secure Psychiatric Unit that I could get out again. I don't think it's probable at all. I think the possibility is one of those sort of million to one sort of things. But I know it's possible. And if I did get out, I think it is possible that I could kill again. He went on to testify that he'd been fantasizing about committing murders since his early years.

I've known I was not in the normal type of guy for years by that point. When did you start to realize that? Probably was when I was around 14 and wanted to kill my mom. Chris detailed some of his specific fantasies involving his mother, including pouring boiling water on her sensitive parts and covering her with sugar and leaving her outside for the crows to pluck at

among other things. Chris claimed that his mother had abused him growing up, and he blamed his social isolation on being homeschooled. He also insisted that he had no emotional attachment to her, and that the only reason he didn't kill her was that he would have been an obvious suspect. We thought about killing your mom, right? Yes, I don't love my mom. I hate your mom. Yes, he hates an mom, right? Yes, I don't love my mom. I hate your mom. Yes. Hays an emotion, right? Yes.

What you said to your lawyers is, you don't kill people you have any emotional attachment to, right? Yes. Hays an emotion, isn't it? There's a difference between emotional attachment and emotional, Mr. Stiles, and I don't think you like me.

Do you have an emotional attachment to me? Mr. Rivel, you don't want to know what I think. That's not the problem. That's true. Okay. You need to answer my questions. You don't get to ask the questions here. My question to you is very simple.

Eight is an emotion, isn't it? Yes, it is. And you had eight towards your mom? Yes, I did. So that's still an emotion directed at your mom? It's directed at my mom, yes. And you didn't kill your mom? No.

And you didn't kill your mom because you needed to get caught. In 2007, Chris participated in a series of interviews where they psychiatrist named Grace Talasuro. This is when Chris's mother, to Mara Gribble, first learned that Chris had been thinking about killing her. At some point along the line in Chris's, seeing Dr. Talleriko, she called us and said she wanted to meet briefly with both of us. We came in and she said, I need to talk with you about a number of issues that have come

up during counseling. She said that there had been an issue of what she called inappropriate touching with somebody at church. And I said, what does that mean? She said somebody had touched him inappropriate. I said, did someone molest my child? And she said, no, it was just inappropriate touching somebody put their arm around him. I said, okay.

And she said, and also you need to know he's made death threats against both of you. And we said, is it serious? And she said, no, I think it's just, you know, how teenagers say, oh, I wish you were dead and he's flowing off steam and he's not a danger to anyone. It's not a problem. So was that the first time you found out about that? That was the first time I found out about it. And at least what you were told that didn't sound serious.

No, and she said, I have to tell you legally I have requirements when there have been death threats made. I have to tell you and inform you. She said, but in my opinion there's no issue there at all. He's not a danger to himself or to you. How did you feel after that? Very upset. I couldn't imagine him being that kind of angry. He'd never said to me, I hate you, I wish you were dead, did he think like that? The human mind is capable of so many things, such ability for good. But when something goes wrong, that capable mind can be our worst enemy. Chris was handcuffed as soon as that first guilty verdict was read, and then the rest of the verdicts

were read. Guilty, on all charges. The 19-year-old Christopher Grimmel would now be treated by society as the monster he had longed to be. The disciples of destruction, his only legacy in life. Thank you so much for joining us once again for this episode, we hope you've enjoyed it. You know we love you, right? Murder Daddy loves you. Just a reminder that the next

regular episode will be the last one before summer break. We're going to take a little bit of a break after episode 117 to recharge the batteries, refill the creative juices, and we will be back with episode 118. So thanks again for joining us. Until next time, stay safe. you