Parents Behaving Badly

Original Post Here

Read It Here

And Post Here

Kidnapping staged to get money from ex, feds say:

This sounds like a plot to a bad 70’s sitcom.

Alejandra Arriaza of Miami, Florida told her 17-year-old son that she was taking him to Wal-Mart to buy him an iPhone. Instead he was kidnapped by a ‘masked intruder’. The ‘intruder’ then directed Arriaza to a trailer where ‘El Negro” was waiting. Really? El Negro was the best they could come up with? Why not Senor Grande? The kidnappers called the boy’s father for ransom. He had recently come into money from the sale of a business. Arriaza even told the father that the ‘kidnappers’ were using a blow torch on the boy’s feet.

They might have gotten away with it too if it wasn’t for those meddling FBI agents. The FBI found the location of the trailer. The boy was able to identify one of his captors as Alejandra Arriaza’s penis, Angel Ponce. The penis’ cousin, Joel Boza, was also charged in the kidnapping.

It was all a plot for Arriza to get some money from her ex-husband. Greed really does make people do incredibly stupid things. Kidnapping, faked or otherwise, is a federal offense and the trio could be sentenced to life behind bars.

Thanks to Lori for the tip.

Woman allegedly swaps children for cockatoo:

So if you saw an ad for a cockatoo for sale but couldn’t afford the seller’s price what would you do? If your 51-year-old Donna Louise Greenwell of Pitkin, Louisiana you offer two kids ages 4 and 5 for the bird.

Now let’s reverse the question here for a second. If you’re selling a cockatoo and someone offers you two kids for the cockatoo what would you do? If you’re Brandy Lynn Romero, 27, and Paul J. Romero, 46, of Evangeline Parish, Louisiana you accept the kids as payment.

How do these people keep finding each other? Do mouth breathing cretins like this have some kind of newsletter I don’t know about or a secret handshake or something?

The worst part is that the kids didn’t even belong to Greenwell in the first place. The kids’ real mother is a fugitive on the run from the law and that the kids may have been traded from family to family over the past year. To make matters even worse Greenwell is a pedophile with a long criminal history.

All 3 have been charged with kidnapping.

Seriously, is there some kind of trailer trash underground that trades the children of fugitives? And if you were looking at jail time wouldn’t you make sure your kids were ok instead of pawning them off on someone who might trade them for meth or something?

The Smoking Gun has the mugshots for your enjoyment.

Thanks to Lori for the tip.

Missing Mom, 8-Year-Old Found:

Tammy Kongham has been captured. The woman who kidnapped her daughters from their school in Philadelphia and took them to live on the streets of Fort Lauderdale was taken into custody this morning. Her 8-year-old daughter was with her. As I previously posted Kongham sent away her 10-year-old daughter to wander the streets on her own because in Kongham’s mind it would make it harder for police to find her. Obviously that theory didn’t work out too well.

The article states that the Florida child endangerment charges might be waived to make for prosecution of the Pennsylvania kidnapping charges. Wouldn’t there be federal kidnapping charges since she took her kids across state lines?

Thanks to LadyJade for the tip.

A few quick updates on the case reported earlier…

Liz Carrol has been convicted and is expected to serve at least 54 years in prison.

Donna Trevino, the birth mother has said she is happy with the verdict and sentence.

Trevino has also filed a multi-million dollar lawsuit against Liz and David Carrol as well as the agency that placed her son with them. She also has two other children in foster care, which she is trying to get back.

30 year old foster mother, Liz Carroll, made plans to leave her 3-year old developmentally disabled boy alone, while she attends an out of state weekend family reunion with her husband David and their live-in companion Amy Baker. In a seriously major lapse of judgment they decided it best to wrap him in a blanket, bind him with packing tape and shove him in a closet.

The boy died that weekend.

In a desperate attempt to hide their mistakes, David Carroll, accompanied by Amy Baker, burned the body and proceeded to dump his remains into the Ohio River.

Amy Baker is not being charged in exchange for her testimony.

David Carroll is to be tried separately next month.

Though Liz Carroll was not convicted of murder, she has been convicted on seven counts including involuntary manslaughter, kidnapping, felonious assault and three counts of child endangerment by the Clermont County jury. She is currently being tried separately for a murder charge.

I only wish their cases were tried in Texas.

Hosanna! The mom and four kids who were abducted this weekend have been found safe in a motel room. The childrens’ father, Jerry D. White, took them there by force after invading the home of his ex-girlfriend Kimberly M. Walker, shooting her sister’s boyfriend in the process. Police arrested the ne’er-do-well dad as he tried to escape through the motel heating vent.

Heheheheheh. Sorry, but I can’t get the image out of my head of White’s legs dangling out of a vent as police shout “FREEZE!!” and point pistols at his ass.

Authorities were able to trace White because Walker had been able to make several calls to a family from a nearby pay phone. It’s unclear if White let her call the family, or if she snuck out. If the latter, he may be one of the dumbest criminals to grace the Earth. Either that, or he’s just a deeply troubled man who, when push came to shove, couldn’t cause any real harm to his family. Mind you, he nearly killed a man, so let’s not give Jerry D. White too much credit.

Thank God we can laugh about it now. This is a fitting end to what might have been an awful tragedy. If only they all ended like this…

CNN is reporting that police are on the hunt for Jerry D. White of Elkhart, Indiana, who burst into the home of Kimberly Walker, shot her sister’s fiance, and abducted Walker and their four children, ranging in ages from 16 months to nine years.

White and Walker’s 9-year-old, Jaylan, is a severe asthmatic who needs to be on a ventilator several times daily; White left the ventilator behind. Nice.

It’s way to early to tell how this is going to end, but based on that tidbit of evidence, and on the fact that police have found the cars White and Walker were driving, I have a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.

No time for a bigger post right now. Thanks for everybody who’s been sending tips; I’ll get to them as time warrants. Meanwhile, remember the case of the Utah parents who kidnapped their daughter to prevent her from getting married? Lemuel and Julia Redd appeared on Good Morning America today and said “sorry” for abducting their daughter on the day of her wedding. Attorneys are working on a plea deal as we speak. Frankly, I think this was all just an elaborate plan by the Redds to avoid buying their daughter a wedding gift. They’re not dangerous criminals – they’re just cheap! But seriously, I doubt these people are menaces to society. Let’s just give ‘em two years probation and call it a deal, ‘k?

It’s very generous for a mother and father who already have five children to take in a 9-year-old girl from their homeland, and treat her as if she were her own daughter. But when the parents choose instead to treat her worse than they would the family cat, it’s criminal. Abdel-Nasser Youssef Ibrahim and his ex-wife Amal Ahmed Ewis Abdel-Motelib were both sentenced to prison this week for keeping young Shyima captive in their home for two years as the family’s unpaid servant. In a delicious twist, District Judge James V. Selna decided to augment the jail time by demanding the couple pay Shyima $152,000 in back wages.

The bad news: Shyima’s time in her home prison was torture. The parents apparently worked the girl to the bone, verbally abusing her along the way. Mom, dad, and the five kids called her “the stupid girl” – a prophecy they fulfilled by allowing her no schooling, no playmates, no downtime. She was threatened with arrest if she dared step foot outside the home. Her best friend was a spider. When police found her, her skin was dead and hard. She was only rescued after a curious neighbor wondered why she wasn’t in school.

The disgusting news: Ibrahim and Abdel-Motelib, who are facing deportation following their jail sentences, tried to maintain that they were helping the girl and being charitable toward her. Hmmm…how do you say “pigfuckers” in Arabic?

The good news: Shyima, now 17, is being adopted by a California couple, Jenny and Chuck Hall, who apparently treat her the way a child deserves to be treated – as a daughter, not as a slave. Shyima, as a parent, let me say that my heart breaks that you had to endure this bullshit. May you continue to heal, and end up healthier and happier than you could ever imagine.

Have you ever heard of the Old German Baptist Brethren? (Not to be confused with the German Baptist Brethren, and certainly not to be mixed up with those bastards the Old Order German Baptist Brethren.) They’re an Anabaptist group, theologically similar in some ways to the Mennonite and the Amish. I’d never heard of the conservative religious group until I stumbled across this story about 34-year-old Michael Hari of Illinois, who’s standing trial for kidnapping his daughters, Mollie, 15, and Allene, 13.

How does this relate to the Old German Baptist Brethrens? According to the article, Hari is a member of the church, which according to the writeup prohibits educating girls after the eight grade. I couldn’t actually confirm this in any statement of belief about the OGBB, so I’m taking that one with a grain of salt. The best I could gather is that the OGBB don’t support “higher” education. But it seems that even that opposition has eroded in recent years.

Whatever the reason, something inside Hari compelled him to skip the country with his daughters in tow, landing him and the girls to a Mennonite colony in Belize. Hari’s attorney denies that his client fled to Belize. But he seems incapable of explaining why Hari told his ex-wife, Michelle Frakes, that he’d be drop the girls off in “a couple of hours” – and then thoroughly disappeared for 10 months. Hari’s attorney also doesn’t explain how a private investigator tracked the wayward dad to Belize, and why it took no less than Dr. Phil McGraw to talk the guy into returning voluntarily to the states. (You can find the full account of The Dr. Phil Show’s involvement on RickRoss.com.)

This is one of those cases that make me glad I never became a defense attorney. There just can’t be that much job satisfaction in manufacturing excuses for people like Michael Hari. If I wanted to tell lies for a living, I’d get a more socially respectable job – like, say, being a TV news anchor, or a presidential press secretary.

Hallelujah. Just when it looked like this story was dropping off of the press radar, the FBI announced that they had found Renee Terrell and Christopher Luttrell, the Kentucky mom and boyfriend accused of beating social worker Boni Frederick to death and taking off with Terrell’s baby. The duo were found in Madison County, Illinois. There isn’t much information available at this point. The baby, however, appears to be unharmed – a major miracle in what is otherwise a putrid tragedy.

I’ll keep publishing updates as they come in. This is just the start of the long process of bringing these two to justice, and figuring out what went haywire in their little minds and led them to believe that beating an innocent woman to death was a keen idea.

Thanks to true crime blog buddy Home Sweet Home for updating me that Renee Terrell and Christopher Wayne Luttrell have been spotted in Illinois. The couple, as reported last night, are accused of beating 67-year-old social worker Boni Frederick to death and fleeing the state of Kentucky with Terrell’s baby, who had been in state custody. Here’s a picture of the breadwinner boyfriend Luttrell, apparently taken while the ink on his swastika tattoo was still drying. News station 14 WFIE has video of Luttrell getting out of the car at a gas station and using a credit card to fill the tank. The card was traced back to the duo.

My mother caught most of the early morning talk shows that were discussing this case. Apparently, this is NOT the first baby that Terrell has had taken away from her. This story from KOBTV indicates that Terrell has “a history” of abusing children under her care. Kind of makes you rethink forced sterilization, doesn’t it?

Based on that track record, why was the social worker EVER told to go to the home alone for a visit? Why didn’t they make the mother come to the social services office instead? Sending poor Boni Frederick into that home alone was dangerously stupid. Of course, I’m sure her colleagues don’t need me telling them that at this point. But it’s sad that it takes a tragdy like this for a simple change in safety procedures to occur.

In case you hadn’t heard: Racist kidnappers Nicholas and Lola Kampf have been indicted by a grand jury in Maine for kidnapping their daughter, Katelyn, and attempting to force her to abort her child. The indictment includes felony kidnapping and terrorizing charges, plus a misdemeanor assault charge for holding their daughter down and tying her up.

This will be a very interesting case to follow. Excuse me while I go heat up some popcorn.

For background, check out the rest of our Nicholas and Lola Kampf coverage. Also make sure to check out our continuing coverage of parents who kidnap their own offspring.

Hold onto your hats, folks – we have MORE news of parents kidnapping their own adult children! Thanks to Nicholas and Lola Kampf for kicking off this latest trend in parental stupidity, in which moms and dads who could stand to work on their control issues attempt to save their offspring from themselves. Now, Lemuel and Julia Redd of Salt Lake City, Utah don’t quite make the Worst Parent Ever bar set by the Kampfs, who tried to have their daughter’s fetus vacuumed out of her womb against her will. But worry not, Mr. and Mrs. Redd: there’s still a nice, hot circle of Hell reserved for folks who kidnap their daughter-bride and make her miss her own wedding. The Redds told Julianna Redd that they were taking her shopping, and instead drove her 240 miles away from the temple where her wedding was scheduled to commence in only a few hours.

No motive is given for her parents’ rabid distaste over watching their girl get hitched. Perry Myers, the husband of the 21-year-old young woman (they married four days after the kidnapping), says he doesn’t think it has anything to do with him. It rarely does, dude. Suffice it to say, your in-laws are whackjobs, and you’re stuck with ‘em for the rest of their natural lives. Fortunately, it doesn’t look like Perry will have to worry about awkward conversations over the Thanksgiving table any time soon: Mr. and Mrs. Kidnapper faces up to 15 years in prison for their crime. By the time they’re done serving time, the 50-something couple will be on death’s doorstep. Whew! Talk about dodging a bullet there…