8-Year-Old Arizona Boy Admits to Double Murder
An 8-year-old Arizona boy suspected in the deaths of his father and another man can be heard in a videotape of his police interview telling officers that he shot both men after he came home from school.
The boy has been charged in juvenile court with two counts of murder. Police say the boy used a .22-caliber rifle to kill the men in St. Johns, about 170 miles northeast of Phoenix, as his father and his co-worker, Romans, came home from work. The boy’s stepmother wasn’t home.
Ok, so two questions…Why did the police release this tape and why isn’t there a lawyer with the child? Just questions I have. Thoughts?
From the Associated Press:
Sitting in an oversized chair, his feet dangling above the floor, the boy told law enforcement officials in an hour long police video released Tuesday that he found the bodies of his father, Vincent Romero, 29, and Timothy Romans, 39, when he returned home from school.
“I was thinking, ‘What the heck is going on?’” the boy said in the video released to The Associated Press and other media. “‘Who did this? Why would anyone do this?’”
The boy eventually admits to having pulled the trigger Nov. 5. As the video wraps up, he buries his head in his jacket.
“I’m going to go to juvie,” the boy says after an officer asks what he’s thinking.
At one point, the boy told authorities he had been mad at his father. He said he was supposed to bring home some papers from school earlier in the week and got spanked by his stepmother at his father’s request because he didn’t.
From CNN:
The boy, sitting cross-legged in an overstuffed armchair, initially denied involvement in the shootings but later said he shot his already wounded father “because he was suffering.”
The two officers questioning the boy press him to tell the truth, with one saying at one point, “If you’re not honest with me, if you’re not truthful, it’s not going to look good.”
The boy later appears to admit to shooting his father, saying, “After I shot him once he was still moving, I think I shot him again.”
He says on the tape he shot both men twice.
Police released the first 12 minutes of the tape, which did not include the alleged confession, earlier Tuesday and released the remainder of the tape late Tuesday afternoon.
Tags: 8 Year old killer, 8 Year Old Murder, 8 year old murderer, Apache County, Arizona Murder, Boy Kills Father, Phoenix, Police Interrogation, St. Johns, Timothy Romans, Vincent Romero
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November 19, 2008 at 3:10 am
Shame on the police for releasing this tape and shame on the media for playing it every 15 minutes. Whether or not he killed his father (and by all accounts he most likely did), he is still an eight-year-old boy and it sickens me to my very core that we can be so callous in such a tragic situation.
November 19, 2008 at 6:47 am
Get the child some counceling and then decide if it was him. Also, the police should act as if it was someone other than the child and make sure there are no other suspects.
November 19, 2008 at 4:02 pm
The police here are total fools. Not only did they improperly question this child and taint his memory, they just shot themselves by releasing the tape. They appear brutish at best, and as child abusers at worst. It is very similar to the infamous Ryan Harris case. Remember that this child has been paraded around in handcuffs and shackles. Even with counseling, we may never know the truth because the power of suggestion has already placed a memory in his head – and people have been telling him that he did it – they have imprisoned him for God’s sake. We will NEVER know what happened!
November 19, 2008 at 4:53 pm
The biggest problem with the way the police acted is that they, from all apperances, deliberately broke the law to get this “confession.” I have one really important test for the courts to make. Take the boy to a shooting range, take an unloaded gun, since no one has ever said it was loaded prior to the shooting, and have the boy load it with blanks and then shoot it! At the very least turn the safety on and see if he knows how to turn it off and shoot it. Make him aim at a target the size of a person, but not in the shape of a person (they know the gunshot pattern from the bodies!) And see if the boy can even fire the weapon!
The officers who conducted the “interview” shoudl be prosecuted NOW for their illegal activities. Not after the boy’s trial, not later, but NOW! If the courts will act in the way they are suppose to in events like this maybe, just maybe someone will find out what really happened.
But I am afraid from the statements made by the police, “we have the killer” that too much evidence is going to be contaminated to do any good. This whole thing looks like as setup of this child. And most of the time if something looks like a set up, it is a setup.
November 19, 2008 at 4:57 pm
This baby is innocent. The police are hearing but they are not listening to what he is actually saying. If his father taught him how to use a gun/hunt, and he is as good a father as his neighbors said he is, he would have taught him how to shoot an animal and then if necessary, take it out of his it’s misery once it is wounded so that it “does not suffer”, by shooting it again. That’s teaching him compassion. This little boy came in and found the door open, he called for his dad, not to kill him but because the door was unusaully OPENED. Seeing him already on the floor bleeding, he got the gun, shot him again, to put him out off his misery, because he didn’t want to see him suffer. Just like his father had taught him to do with the animals. Now in his mind, he killed his dad because it was his shot take took his father’s final breath. But did he initially shoot him? Now listen to the interrogation, they are leading him into a confession. HE IS INNOCENT.
November 19, 2008 at 6:06 pm
It’s horrible that this happened, but I think the boy is guilty from what he said about putting the father out of his suffering. If we believe the boy’s statement about this, then his shot was in fact the coup-de-grace that killed the father. Terribly tragic.
November 19, 2008 at 6:51 pm
The “put the father out of his misery” theory – that someone shot him first and the kid shot later – is a very interesting possibility because the boy would have the residue on his clothes and his prints on the gun. Likewise, it shows an absolute lack of understanding of what he did, which goes to his lack of capacity to commit the crime. I have theorized that there are several scenarios for what happened: that the boy could be a complete victim of a false confession; or he might have accidentally shot the gun and then went into panic mode and killed; he might be taking the rap for an adult who did the shooting; he might be an organic sociopath; he might be confused and brainwashed. Either way, we will never know the full and accurate truth because the police have so hopelessly mangled this case. It would have been quite simple to bring in an adult and stop the questioning. They had plenty of time to initiate a thorough investigation but they chose not to do so – they grabbed the low-hanging fruit and went with the sensationalistic headline. This is a disgraced police chief from up north trying to redeem himself – sadly he decided to do it on the body of a small boy.
This case really looks like the Ryan Harris case – when cops in Chicago managed to extract a murder and rape confession from two boys – 7 and 8 – and in doing so totally destroyed one of the boys. Although they were completely exonerated and won settlements from the state, they were seriously damaged psychologically by the ordeal. Money can’t mend everything.
I expect that someone will get Michael Crowe to talk on camera about his confession – when police goaded him into saying that he and 3 friends killed his sister. One of the other friends even confessed as well!
Let’s remember the Central Park Jogger case – a sexual predator/serial murderer confessed a few years ago and his DNA matches the DNA found at the scene. But the cops and prosecutors in that case STILL refuse to admit that they sent the wrong boys to jail. AMAZING. People actually believe that a confession is air-tight. It never is – which is why some countries require confessions to be backed up by court testimony of the accused prior to acceptance of the testimony.
November 19, 2008 at 6:53 pm
“If we believe the boy’s statement about this, then his shot was in fact the coup-de-grace that killed the father. Terribly tragic.”
perhaps … but, how believable is the child’s confession? there have been plenty of instances of false confessions from adults, who had initially proclaimed innocence, only to confess after police interrogation. by their very nature, interrogations are coercive. not that it’s necessarily a bad thing when it is tempered with defendants’ rights, but there is a very valid argument here that this kid didn’t even have the option to exercise his rights. the first thing that hit me when i saw the confession is how calm this kid is while confessing. it doesn’t seem to me how one would act when confessing to a double murder when you know that’s what you are doing. rather, it doesn’t seem to me like this kid knew the gravity of the situation, or had any clue as to what the consequences of his talking to the police would be. i wouldn’t expect too many 8 years olds to understand that. and, i highly doubt he was familiar enough with the legal system to understand he has a right to counsel, and a right to end the interrogation (or not even begin it in the first place). even if he were given his miranda rights, i’d still question whether a waiver was knowing and voluntary.
i understand the hesitancy of the police to get a defense attorney involved. s/he’ll do what they all do, and stonewall the police to whatever extent possible. but, that’s the parameters of the law as it stands now. everyone has a right to counsel and to remain silent during custodial interrogation, and waivers must be knowing and voluntary. the law isn’t structured to deal efficiently with 8 year olds going through the criminal process for double murders. but, until anything changes, that’s what we’ve got and everyone has to play by the rules.
November 19, 2008 at 7:00 pm
I THINK THE POLICE OVERSTEPPED THEIR AUTHORITY, I FEEL VERY BAD FOR THIS CHILD. A CHILD WILL SAY ANYTHING TO PLEASE ESPECIALLY IF THE OTHER PERSON HAS A BADGE AND GUN. EVERYONE SHOULD REMEMBER THIS IS A EIGHT YEAR OLD CHILD….
November 19, 2008 at 7:15 pm
Alawyer,
so true. i saw a video not long ago about a guy who was wrongfully convicted. 12 years after the conviction they had dna evidence that exonerated the guy. defense counsel initiated proceedings to reverse the conviction, and the prosecutors sat there and argued that a single eyewitness ID (who admitted to being under duress at the time of witnessing the crime) was conclusive or, at the very least, was better evidence than dna.
it’s amazing that people today still believe that certain evidence, like eyewitness IDs or confessions, are conclusive and unassailable. if they would actually examine either, people would see that, oftentimes, they’re the weakest evidence of it all.
November 19, 2008 at 9:20 pm
I am looking at every possible angle that I can come up with – and I am looking at my 7 year old son. I first want to believe that boy is absolutely innocent, because he is innocent until proven guilty, or I thought that was how the law was supposed to work.
Absolute disgrace – the two police officers who pushed that child into a confession. They should be STRIPPED of their badges.
I am leaning toward the mercy-killing. Dad was already suffering. That is the first thing that popped into my head when the boy states that in the interview. I remember what I was told when I was a child, about a harmed animal; why we would shoot a hurt a horse with a lame ankle/leg. He didn’t want his father to suffer.
Now, how dad and Tim got to be suffering to begin with, I hate to imagine, but because of the complete MOCKERY of the legal system that unfolded on that video, I believe we will never know the truth, and that little boy was already damaged, prior to the interview.
They took what he had to say, chewed it up, added filth and lies and fed it back to him – forcing it down his throat, until they got what they wanted to hear. DISGUSTING. “We’re all going to tell the truth”?!?!?!?! WHAT A LOAD OF #$*()*#$
SHAME ON THEM.
My son will tell me I cooked a good dinner because he doesn’t want to hurt my feelings and he knows that’s what I want to hear – heck, my husband still does the same thing.
Two wrongs don’t make a right.
November 20, 2008 at 12:57 am
first let me say that at age 32, after having removed a violent intruder from my own home, i was asked by the responding officer to explain it all so he could understand what happened. then he asked me to explain it again. and again but slower and in more detail.
i was then taken into custody – not arrested but handcuffed for my own safety – and driven to the sheriff’s office where i sat handcuffed to a bench for 4 hours. the responding officer then brought out a large stack of papers for me to sign. these included my ’statement of fact’ regarding the incident. IMMEDIATELY AFTER signing that document i was read my rights, told that i had confessed and booked for felony assault.
i’m an intelligent, cynical, savvy adult man and i got blindsided. never in a million years did i ever think that as the victim of a crime i was being ‘interrogated’ as a ’suspect’. never would i have thought to ask for an attorney while i described how i removed an intruder from my home.
bottom line, cops decide first based on emotion and backfill reality. anything you say that confirms their opinion makes it to the report. anything you say that doesn’t confirm their opinion just evaporates.
sadly, this sort of thing happens all the time and no one ever hears about it because, really, isn’t everyone arrested and charged for a good reason? i mean, the cops wouldn’t just make something up because they feel like it?
would they?
the fact that this is an 8 year old got it into the public consciousness and now people are seeing the games that cops play. self important, self appointed custodians of public safety, convinced that a populace that abides by the law is the goal, even if the arbiters of the law have to disregard it to serve it.
i wonder if those two high fived after they ‘broke’ him?
this kid didn’t do it. sorry but, he didn’t.
meanwhile the story of what DID happen is long gone. sounds like the kid’s future is too.
*high five!*
November 20, 2008 at 7:10 pm
This kid is 8 years old. Come on now, he’ll say anything to please an adult, and plus, a police officer? Of course he is terrified and will say what he thinks the officers wants to hear. I’m not saying he is innocent or not but we have to keep in mind this kid is 8, and everyone ( media, police, people) have filled his mind with their accusation. i just don’t think people took the right action towards getting him to explain what happen.
November 23, 2008 at 12:10 pm
The handling of this case by the local police there is just “stupid” for lack of a better word.
Some comfort I have when it comes to this case is knowing…childeren are treated differently in defference to the fact that they’re childeren, and so less responsable for their actions — they have not yet reached the point where ‘they should have known better’. so, the law (usually) takes a less punative, and more rehabilatative, stance.
November 24, 2008 at 2:02 pm
I agree with Susie.
I don’t have any police experience, but I believe even I could get a meek 8 year-old boy to confess to anything. I have sons, and I recall at that age, “truth” wasn’t so cut and dry. “Truth” was sometimes telling the adult what they want to hear if they don’t believe the real truth. Remember the McMartin pre-school kids? Some as adults later said all they knew at the time was that they weren’t leaving that room and going home until they told the interviewer what they wanted to hear. And so they did.
Forensics, like gun shot residue on hands and blood splatter, should be able to tell if this boy could have really done that. But that “confession” sounds very suspect. I’m happy they are going back to the drawing board.
November 24, 2008 at 6:11 pm
I feel so sorry for the child. I don’t believe he did it. First of all, he told police initially he didn’t do it. After some coercing, he admitted it. Children know that adults have all the authority and try to please them by agreeing with them. it also says that the men were shot 4 times in another report, and that he has to reload for each shot. You can’t tell me that after shooting his dad once, the other man in the house didn’t come running. He wouldn’t have had time to kill both men if having to reload each time. Pray for him
December 1, 2008 at 3:02 am
I reserve judgment. On this clip, you don’t hear any sort of coercing going on, just a woman, presumably police officer, asking perfectly calm, friendly-sounding questions, and the boy also sounding calm, if a bit sad.
January 24, 2009 at 3:52 pm
If anyone is truely into GOD, they will know that this could not have been doen by a child of GOD. We are all GODS children until WE on our own will choose to walk a different direction. This boy was to close to GOD to do such a thing. I have an 8 year old boy and three others(4,6&10) he has three other sibblings who he can and has put blame on. But if I break him down over and over agian and tell him how disapointed I am in him he will end up confessing to whatever has been doen. The thing is half of the time I find out later on he was not even the one to do it. (same goes for all the others) Thoes ROOKIE officers (dosn’t mater how long they are on the force they are still ROOKIES) broke that boy down in such a demonic matter until he finaly said “yes um I think I shot him” HELLO!!!! I hope and pray to GOD every night that thoes police officers are not and will never have the chance to raise GODS blessings because they themselfs are pure EVIL!!! I literaly cried for two weeks , lost weight could not sleep truely could not function until I gave my feelings to GOD like I should. I now am comforted by the fact that theese officers will have thier “judgment day” and that boy will be home soon in his mothers arms. I truely have faith in our holy father!!! To the boy: GOD bless you baby ,this happened for a reason and you are truely a saint in GODS eyes always remember that and you can get through anything!!!! I LOVE YOU!!!