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[Music] % [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
00:01:46
for listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always as a man that knows right now the toughest job in America is
00:01:53
fantasy football commissioner here is our captain they call me the commiss it's good good to be seeing and good to
00:02:00
see you thanks for listening thanks for t a [Music] friend today we are sipping on some day
00:02:12
raider Belgian style white ale by the beer Wizards over at Kelson Brewing Company day raider features a light malt
00:02:19
body with wonderful Aromas of citrus garage grade four out of five bottle caps all right let's toast some of our
00:02:27
friends before we get started here's cheers to our friend Shelly in Milwaukee and a big shout out to Susan in
00:02:34
Lancaster County Pennsylvania next up Captain we have Ashley who's all the way out in peblo West Colorado and a big we
00:02:43
like your jib to Jill in Manhattan Kansas next up Captain we have Lisa in Covington Georgia and here is a very
00:02:52
special Ron Swanson please and thank you to my beer drinking friend Ira B in Nova
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Scotia everyone we just mentioned contributed to this week's beer fund and for that we
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thank you yeah BW you in beer run and if you would like to support the show I would go to trm garage.com and click on
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the Donate Panner also for our old episodes download the Stitcher app they are free and we have a bonus show called
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off the Record if you're not listenting then you're not in the no get right get Stitcher premium and one you shut the
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hell up all right that's enough of the business all right everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's
00:03:38
talk some true crime [Music] [Applause] as hard as they were to hear at times we
00:04:20
have sat through the interviews of four of the five individuals being interviewed for the murder of Kimberly
00:04:29
Kates and now we have step sper who is left Chris Gribble gave us a good amount of
00:04:36
information and he showed us what kind of Heartless individual he actually is it's time for Steph sper did he tell the
00:04:45
same story as Gribble and a nutshell no instead sper threw his childhood friend right under the bus the affidavit sums
00:04:57
it up best quote sper told the police in substance that he did not commit the charged crimes that he did not know who
00:05:06
did it that whoever did it should get the death penalty he also stated that on October 4 he was at the Pheasant Lane
00:05:15
Mall in NASA with Christopher Gribble while he pawned jewelry presumably the jewelry taken
00:05:23
from the Kate's home sper then lawyered up and refused to talk to the authorities this is
00:05:31
confusing as we saw these boys took pains to make sure that they were not caught they wore gloves they got rid of
00:05:40
their clothes they cleaned the blood evidence up with bleach and other cleaning agents but then they told
00:05:47
everyone they knew about the murders here's what the affidavit says the boys blabbed about to people during
00:05:56
the day on Sunday sper told Jamie Holland remember he was at Kyle Fenton's house all about the murder quote because
00:06:05
he trusted him as we know they also told Fen all about it and his mom was the one
00:06:12
who actually called the police Gribble said that they threatened Elden spikes on Sunday remember that spikes was
00:06:20
hanging out with the four of them that Sunday and they all had gone together to the pawn shop to sell some items stolen
00:06:28
from the house when sper found out Spike's girlfriend knew about the murder he threatened him and so did Gribble
00:06:35
they showed a number of people the knives on Sunday but then became concerned that so many people knew so
00:06:42
they cleaned the knife and the machete and the sheets with bleach and alcohol and then buried the knives in the woods
00:06:50
they also buried a pearl necklace they stole from the Kate's home that they could not Pawn these items were
00:06:57
collected by investigators after Gribble LED them to the burial spot this is not
00:07:03
laid out in the affidavit but it seems likely that at least one of them told his girlfriend as we know that Glover's
00:07:11
girlfriend called and yelled at him about it also Jillian Baptist Spader's girlfriend was included in an outing to
00:07:20
the Pheasant Lane Mall where they pawned the jewelry she testified that she later
00:07:27
learned what they had done and cut ties with sper right and let's go back to the
00:07:32
idea that we know that Gribble is a horrible person but he's also telling the authorities hey sper is actually the
00:07:41
real deal so now let's get into the autopsy and the charges the medical examiner found that Kimberly Kates died
00:07:48
from 32 sharp injuries to her head neck torso left arm and left leg from two different weapons manner of death of
00:07:56
course homicide she was alive unfortunately for the entirety of the attack per the medical examiner's
00:08:04
testimony during all of the blows she was alive these included one that broke apart her upper arm bone and two that
00:08:12
broke open her skull and sunk into her brain the medical examiner also said that her throat was
00:08:20
cut and one eyeball was dislodged from the force of the blows jimie the 11-year-old girl suffered multiple
00:08:29
debilitating injuries she had a broken jaw she had a punctured lung she had to have part of her foot amputated as well
00:08:38
as Skin graphs for multiple lacerations that required plastic surgery one wound penetrated and fractured her skull her
00:08:47
elbow was broken she had multiple stab wounds from what looked like a small knife per the sentencing memo quote her
00:08:56
treating physicians at Children's Hospital and B Austin testified that they had never treated any patient adult
00:09:03
or child with that many stab or hack wounds end quote a doctor testified at one of the trials that jimie would have
00:09:12
died of a punctured lung if she had lost Consciousness before calling the police within 2 days the detailed arrest
00:09:23
affidavit we have been reading from was filed with the Milford District Court that laid out the case against the four
00:09:31
who participated in the attack on the Kate's family per WMUR quote a little after 6: a.m. on
00:09:42
Tuesday October 6th the State Attorney General's office issued a press release to the media that said four arrests have
00:09:50
been made in connection to the Mount Vernon killing and attack before noon on that same day sper Ribble Marx and
00:10:00
Glover were arraigned one by one at Milford district court so they're going to charge all five of them yeah so Chris
00:10:08
Gribble and Steven sper were charged with first-degree murder attempted murder and conspiracy to murder as well
00:10:15
as a bunch of lesser charges William Marx and Quinn Glover were charged with burglary conspiracy to burglary and
00:10:24
robbery they were warned that prosecutors would seek a additional indictments when they presented their
00:10:31
cases to a grand jury in early November more charges were forthcoming Autumn seavoy was charged with two counts of
00:10:42
hindering apprehension or prosecution and one count of conspiracy to commit hindering apprehension or prosecution
00:10:50
this was of course because of his throwing the evidence bag into the river and then lying to police about the false
00:10:59
Al question for you maybe you know this um do they have to charge these individuals therefore they can use that
00:11:07
as like some leverage against them to testify well yes of course but they also have to charge them just to hold
00:11:14
continue to hold them at some point if you don't charge them they they have rights as a citizen who's not being
00:11:20
detained and they have to be released so I think what you have here Captain is when you got a A whole batch of [ __ ]
00:11:29
that you have to um charge with an an assortment of charges I think not only does it take
00:11:37
some time to it takes time to Hash that out who's guilty of what and what will the public decide they're guilty of and
00:11:45
and agree to as well so it's hard to overstate the shock you know we've just spent an hour
00:11:55
or so on this case but I want everybody to really kind of sit and think about this for a minute
00:12:02
because it's really hard to State the amount of shock that ensued from the arrest of these boys they had their
00:12:11
problems of course but in general no one saw this coming we talked about the area
00:12:16
that this place had not had a murder in over a hundred years and then when you solve it this quickly or you are making
00:12:24
arrest this quickly and the public can see what's going on and now they're being told that the perpetrators are
00:12:32
children essentially it's it was I mean the the area was in shock from the murder itself and from the attack itself
00:12:40
but now you double down on that that the perpetrators they look like kids on the
00:12:45
evening news they don't look like some monster that strolled into town and and took away one of your own well again it
00:12:53
also depends on what picture they're getting you know if if you take any of these kids and and go back 3 years some
00:13:02
of these kids were doing all right then and obviously the age is a lot younger so they look way more Innocent but just
00:13:10
imagine what these parents are going through we know through some of the testimony that some of the parents knew
00:13:16
that the these kids were going down the wrong path but maybe down the wrong path
00:13:22
for some kids are like oh well now he's he smokes or we caught him smoking some weed or we caught him with a beer or we
00:13:30
you know we caught him making out with his girlfriend or whatever whatever it would be right to go down the wrong path
00:13:36
but most parents are not going to assume the wrong path is taking them down to heinous murder for no reason other than
00:13:44
they just wanted to murder somebody the ABC News put it pretty succinctly saying
00:13:50
that Friends of the teenagers were shocked that the boys who came from middle class families and participated
00:13:56
in activities like school musicals and the boy SC Scouts would conspire to commit such brutality the
00:14:04
community they not only blamed the the boys but some people in the community were blaming the parents of these kids
00:14:11
as well saying that the parents must have ignored the signs that they enabled them yeah and labeling the boys as evil
00:14:20
monsters Psychopaths who deserved the death penalty many people also believe that there were varying levels of
00:14:27
culpability among the pack of five after all according to what the boys were saying only two of them actually
00:14:34
participated in the physical attacks on our two victims sooy wasn't even at the trow Road House at all thankfully none
00:14:45
of them were granted bail they were going to sit in jail and wait for their trial they would have to stay there
00:14:52
until their trial date while all of this was going on our survivor sixth grader Jamie Kates attended her mother's
00:15:02
funeral in a wheelchair she was able to return to school the week of October 27th she and her father issued a
00:15:12
statement that thanked all of the First Responders doctors law enforcement and community members so what's the story
00:15:20
about the the high school yearbook this is an interesting one and this is not something that we would have in a lot of
00:15:27
our cases given the age of the perpetrators but right now we have these five young men as disgusting as they are
00:15:35
they're sitting in a jail cell waiting for their trials and we have the state that's going to be busy preparing
00:15:41
indictments and working to build their case against these individuals in the meantime the
00:15:49
200920 school year is drawing to a close and the Yearbook is going to be released
00:15:56
and this takes place in March of 2010 the high school yearbook contained pictures of all of its students as one
00:16:02
would expect but in this case it includes even the ones in jail for the Kate's murder remember two of these guys
00:16:11
were still in high school at the time of these crimes in fact they were picked up
00:16:16
at school when the police wanted to question these guys right so David Kates he's the father of our young surviving
00:16:25
victim he's the husband of our other victim he sent a letter to the school administrators requesting an apology for
00:16:35
the inclusion of photos of Quinn Glover and William Marx in that year's yearbook
00:16:41
his letter read I can't understand why you made such a disrespectful decision Jaimie is
00:16:48
going to the school in two very short years how can she have respect towards the administration when you were so
00:16:57
disrespectful toward her mother's memory Jamie and our families will survive this
00:17:03
slap in the face but I think the bigger picture is the message you sent to students by condoning the
00:17:11
immortalization of these soulless young men that consciously with intent invaded
00:17:17
our home and took my beautiful wife from Jamie and me chances are that this is was the last thing on the
00:17:26
administrator's mind they probably you you see what I'm saying like maybe one of these kids played on a soccer team
00:17:34
earlier in their career high school career and they won a state championship and their picture is somewhere up in the
00:17:41
hallway administrators might not that might not pop into their head that they need to go take that down just like the
00:17:49
administrators are not in charge of every decision that the yearbook is making there normally is a class for
00:17:56
that or um after school group for that so it wouldn't be the first thing on their mind now mind you again the person
00:18:06
who whatever teacher is in charge of putting together this the yearbook probably should have popped that into
00:18:12
their brain right I mean the the school administration is in control of of whatever class is in charge of the the
00:18:18
yearbook what's crazy is that this is this is a conscious decision it's not as though the yearbook was sent in for
00:18:26
printing in September and when the murders happened in October no one thought to take out the pictures of the
00:18:32
two boys rather the school consulted with the marks and Glover parents who said they wanted to leave the pictures
00:18:40
of their sons in the yearbook so the school decided to go along with that I I get what you're saying if
00:18:48
somebody plays on the soccer team and you got 16 other kids on the team and coaches and what have you you it's very
00:18:55
difficult to go back and retake that picture it's pretty easy to leave leave the little square picture out of
00:19:02
the actual yearbook and I think to to take it a step further that David Kates is is very right his daughter who was
00:19:12
attacked by these guys M she is going to be attending that school in two very short
00:19:22
years and it just seems like as he said I think it's a slap in the face and I think that it's I think it's
00:19:29
disrespectful it's cly it's definitely disrespectful for the fact that they actually talked to the parents and then
00:19:34
they like you said they actually had to make a decision it was on their minds yeah I thought it was just something
00:19:40
that they might have just overlooked and then it's like oh come on give them a break they got so many things to deal
00:19:47
with to run a school that they might overlooked it but the fact that they actually made a decision and talk to the
00:19:53
parents at some point you just tell the parent like look I know why you want to leave the the the kid in the book but
00:20:01
we're going to take him out out of respect for the surviving uh family members and for the victim well and
00:20:09
here's here's the issue that that I have with it I'm 100% on David Kat's side on
00:20:14
this and and I I think I find it actually appalling and and the reason why is it would have taken no more effort to
00:20:24
reach out to David Kates you realized that this was a decision you were going to be making and then it would have it
00:20:32
it carries some weight this is an important decision that you're making you understood so much that you reached
00:20:37
out to the parents of the students reach out to the member of your community and
00:20:43
say we've reached out to the parents they would like to keep the pictures in the yearbook at least get his opinion
00:20:49
they didn't do that right and and here's the thing here's the issue it's innocent
00:20:56
until proven guilty these two have not gone to trial yet they've not been actually convicted or sentenced for
00:21:02
these crimes so I get that maybe the ideas leave them in there because they're innocent the problem with that
00:21:10
is we have a situation where we have confessions of these individuals and these confessions check out it's not
00:21:18
it's not like their confessions and the the police got some teenagers to admit to do something that they didn't do
00:21:25
these confessions track yeah so as administrator you you go I got to call the parents ring ring ring parents hello
00:21:34
um well we have confirm that your kid's a piece of [ __ ] and we're taking them out of the yearbook
00:21:42
yeah I mean all kinds of things you you can have excuses why if you want to defend yourself to the parents and say
00:21:49
look they didn't finish school so we're not including them uh if they are found innocent and they attend next year we'll
00:21:55
put their picture back in the other thing you can do is I personally I wouldn't have even even consulted with
00:22:02
the um with the Glover or Mark's parents in this situation now we have the trials that we need to get to and this
00:22:13
will be five criminal cases that were scheduled to go before a special grand jury which would possibly hand down
00:22:21
murder indictments possibly hand down additional charges this was apparently enough to scare some of these idiot
00:22:28
straight because what we have here now is that three of the five defendants this would be Glover Marx and
00:22:37
seavoy they all agreed to testify against the other two sper and Gribble of course they want to avoid murder
00:22:46
charges so they're willing to cooperate sper and Gribble were both indicted on murder charges and under New Hampshire
00:22:54
law faced mandatory sentences of life in prison without parole if found guilty of
00:23:00
first-degree murder they were not eligible for the death penalty under New Hampshire
00:23:07
law capital murder for which the death penalty is an option was defined at the time as only six types of
00:23:15
Murder One killing an an on duty law enforcement officer or judge a murder For Hire murder committed in connection
00:23:25
with the kidnapping Mur murder committed during rape murder committed During certain drug offenses and murder
00:23:33
committed by a convict already serving a life sentence without Parole in the granite state's
00:23:41
380e history New Hampshire has executed only 24 people and none since the year 1939 before the trials in August of
00:23:55
2010 one of the scheduled Witnesses died died this was Jamie Holland he was the buddy who was with Kyle Fenton when sper
00:24:04
and Gribble showed up and bragged to them about what they had done right Holland himself was no angel he had a
00:24:11
record for burglary of an ice cream shop must have been some good ice cream and at the time of his death was facing
00:24:19
another burglary charge his mother told WM Boston that quote her son was tormented by what he
00:24:29
knew about the Kate's Murder She said he could not sleep after being told about the attacks and being shown the weapons
00:24:38
he was stressed and afraid to testify his mom found him dead in his room one morning in
00:24:45
August he this is her quote to WM she said quote he went to bed perfectly fine and when I woke up in the
00:24:55
morning I found him dead I didn't know know what to do his lips were purple fingernails everything she continued
00:25:03
just the other night he was so stressed out sitting in his room rocking himself back and forth because he's so stressed
00:25:10
he didn't know what to do she said her son was on sleeping pills and anti-depressants but seemed okay that
00:25:17
night when he went to bed it's unclear whether this was a suicide accidental overdose or what but Holland was he
00:25:26
passed on and was not available to testify against sper or Gribble it makes me wonder what sper and Gribble might
00:25:35
have done that we are not aware of because like I said you know boys will sit around and go oh let's go prank
00:25:43
these people or let's go do this or that it seemed like there's a very steep escalation and I'd probably argue that
00:25:53
maybe it wasn't so steep that maybe their their other actions and other heinous things that these
00:26:01
individuals did that we're just not well aware of and when you have a a friend of
00:26:08
these guys I don't think it's just as simple as well I now they know that they're
00:26:15
capable of murder so maybe they'll come after me one day or maybe get somebody else to come after me I think there
00:26:21
would have to be more actions that we're just not aware of that that these friends would know about
00:26:28
and to top that off you might have a situation here where somebody is already struggling with some other things some
00:26:33
other issues maybe they're a bit unstable themselves and then you you add to that the fear of one testifying
00:26:41
against these people but also is there some guilt that this individual was was harboring that that they felt guilty
00:26:53
for who knows I mean maybe this person said to themselves when they were being told what what these two monsters had
00:27:00
done that they weren't going to turn them in or they weren't going to do anything about it right you know so it
00:27:06
could be a whole whole bunch of stuff and and regardless it's just these events these horrible things that people
00:27:16
for whatever reason do to one another and then they put so little thought into it that there are real victims this
00:27:24
isn't just something this isn't Grand Theft Auto that you play on your PlayStation 4 mhm these are real people
00:27:31
these are real consequences you've not only killed this woman and really almost destroyed the life of this
00:27:40
this child but then her every one of her family is a victim and then the perpetrators everyone in their families
00:27:48
are victims as well and it's it's just amazing that the that there's so little thought put
00:27:56
into any of these actions by some of these people now Steven sper his trial would start in
00:28:05
201 he plead not guilty needless to say the state Came Out Swinging causing some jury members to
00:28:13
shed tears with uh prose prosecutory statements like quote Kim and Jim screams did not stop him their cries
00:28:23
their begging their Poli did not stop him because he was was so merciless and he and Gribble were focused on what they
00:28:33
intended to do and planned on doing all along and the simple way to put that is to break in and kill whoever was inside
00:28:44
for fun for kicks ultimately for a few pieces of [Applause] jewelry this show is sponsored by better help do
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intuitively just like when you were a kid and here's the holiday Sparkle grab a lifetime membership now and save 50%
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to answer answer call us at 1888 [Music] [Applause] Freedom a big cheers to everybody a big
00:31:17
cheers to you Colonel and a special cheers to anybody that is still homeschooling their children that would
00:31:25
be a very tough task so this drink is for you and cheers to well don't have a drink but cheers to those who are still
00:31:35
dealing with their parents homeschooling them that can't be easy either yeah I drink pour a little out for everyone my
00:31:43
dad doesn't know math we're all into this all in this together so the sper trial is the key one here Captain
00:31:52
because remember he is the guy that you want to sink he's not only one of the most evil
00:31:57
of the five but he's also the guy that didn't really admit to anything we got everybody else singing like a bunch of
00:32:05
birds saying this is what happened but sper last time he spoke to investigators he says yeah I was with Gribble when he
00:32:12
was out there uh pawning some jewelry uh I wasn't there that night I didn't kill
00:32:17
anybody and I don't know who did yeah I told you how big of a douchebag this guy
00:32:22
is um at his trial at some point it was his birthday and he asked his lawyer do you think the jury will sing Happy
00:32:32
Birthday to me and he like laugh and all smug mhm and what I can say nice about his lawyer is that he definitively said
00:32:43
no like that's the dumbest question you ask you idiot well speaking of Spader's attorney the attorney mounted a defense
00:32:51
which included testimony from a forensic scientist that stated that no DNA or fingerprint evidence belonging to Steven
00:33:00
sper connected him to the scene of the crime of course an awful lot of circumstantial evidence did connect sper
00:33:09
to the crime such as his sweatshirt with his name on it found in the trash bag containing stolen items from the Kates
00:33:17
home and the defense attorneys also W warned the jury that sper co-conspirators or people that had
00:33:26
already confessed to some of these crimes they were going to testify against him but keep in mind jury that
00:33:35
Marx seavoy and Glover who will testify against my client all received deals from the state lessening their
00:33:43
sentences now what do we know about Steven sper people who knew him said that in years past he was a good kid a
00:33:50
nice guy but then in the summer before his sophomore year sper seemed to change he sto stopped paying attention to his
00:33:58
schoolwork started wearing all black and painting his fingernails black he drew a
00:34:04
swastika on his head and declared that he was a member of the Crips I I don't think that's their
00:34:11
symbol I do not mind the children or the peeps wearing the black I do not you know dye the hair black paint the
00:34:18
fingernails doesn't bother me where I get a little concerned and and I'm saying that sarcastically please hear
00:34:25
the sarcasm in my voice is the swastika on someone's head and then claiming to be a member of a
00:34:33
criminal Enterprise such as the Crips now see I don't mind it so much at least they're branding themselves so you can
00:34:39
see their dumbass coming at some point and it seems to be linked to a possible bad breakup he began cutting
00:34:49
himself and he was to be on medication for bipolar disorder but he would often stopped taking this medication and he
00:35:00
was also running away from his parents' home he had anger management issues and his anger would increase if he was off
00:35:09
of his meds or taking recreational drugs now I don't know if his adopted parents
00:35:14
knew this or not I think there was speculation that he did have some trauma in his um younger years before they
00:35:23
actually adopted him yeah and it is a bit of a question mark if they knew this in advance or not uh By the time of the
00:35:33
murder this once good kid uh was now a high school dropout who still lived with his parents well do do you know anything
00:35:42
about when he was real little yes and I was going to get into that okay um and they were forcing him to seek
00:35:51
counseling and they did tell him he needed to get his GED which he he did and he was was taking classes at a
00:35:58
community college this all at the time of the actual murder now according to the Boston Herald friends told the paper
00:36:06
that they beli sper was a Candidate For Suicide not for homicide his mood and behavior grew darker as he matured they
00:36:14
said sper was in and out of treatment programs he shaved his head abused marijuana and speed and cut and burned
00:36:23
his own skin yeah well there was actually a call from his therapist to his parents stating that he made several
00:36:30
threats against them you know saying that he wanted to kill his parents and the parents were like is this something
00:36:36
we should be worried about because I would be as a parent my kid saying he wants to kill me and they're saying no
00:36:42
no it's actually more of a coping mechanism and and he probably actually just wants to hurt himself right and you
00:36:48
want to say to the therapist well you were wrong about that one because if this would if they would have
00:36:54
been free any longer I I would actually think that sper would have went after somebody else either on his own or with
00:37:03
the help of these guys that's I think that's for certain yeah now his grandmother Maryanne sper said of
00:37:11
Spader's parents that they did everything for this boy they gave him everything they were devoted to this kid
00:37:19
his parents she says were the nicest people I don't know how something like this could happen now sper adoptive
00:37:26
parent parents who adopted him at just 5 days old had forced him to go to a treatment program when they observed a
00:37:35
dramatic change in his behavior this was when he was 16 years old this Livin retreat was just months before the
00:37:45
murder the it was an expensive program that they took on themselves in Hope of turning their son around at the
00:37:55
trial prosecutors called a lot of witnesses to establish that sper was in fact a
00:38:02
psychopath and that he planned to murder someone long in advance they presented evidence that in the months leading up
00:38:09
to the attack sper hung out often with Gribble Marx Glover and seavoy during this time he talked about
00:38:17
breaking into people's homes and killing them he also talked about eating people
00:38:24
and roasting their bodies putting heads on Stakes putting bodies in a wood chipper creating displays out of the
00:38:30
bodies for the media to later find torturing creating chloroform to knock out victims so they could be killed in
00:38:38
silence he spent time trying to make chloroform at his home and he had purchased a knife just days before the
00:38:46
crime and sper formed a group of losers called the Disciples of Destruction DOD for short wow what a cool name yeah he
00:38:58
mhm was the self-appointed president of his little Club he actually drafted a mission statement that called for
00:39:05
Bloodshed and he and Marx cased out the trow Road home as we've already talked about and selected that house to hit
00:39:14
they then told Gribble that the crime was to be Gribble's initiation into the dod sper told seavoy
00:39:24
to provide them with an alibi it's not clear why seavoy was not included in the actual committing of the
00:39:34
crime right so we have all these guys saying that look sper he's the evil one or the most evil one he is the leader
00:39:43
and we've all confessed not only to what sper did but what we have done and sper
00:39:49
is still not confessing so now they're going to testify against him and during the testimony this is going to offer
00:39:57
some more details about that actual night and things leading up to the crime and even after saying that you know sper
00:40:05
attended a high school football game on that Saturday there at the high school football game he tells Glover to be
00:40:12
ready that night because he was going to call him so that they could go break into a house he also gave Glover a list
00:40:20
of ingredients to purchase and instructions to make chloroform GL was to bring gloves with
00:40:28
him and a knife the group texted about their plans throughout the day about 10 p.m. Gribble texted sper cool ought to
00:40:37
be a good party to which sper responded we'll have fun around 1:30 a.m. sper texted Glover you've got to get out soon
00:40:48
because we're ready we need completion of the dod to go on Glover waffled about going and sper ordered him to join them
00:40:59
eventually Glover snuck out of his house and got into Gribble's car with the rest
00:41:03
of the dod and on the way to tro Road sper declared that the purpose of the night
00:41:11
was to get Chris into killing so again we keep pointing out that this could on the surface to some seem like oh it's
00:41:21
just teenagers talking this is a lot of talking yeah a lot of preparation for things that seem
00:41:29
to be about what they're all talking about and that's why I'm saying I guarantee you there was there's other
00:41:35
stuff whether it's cruelty to animals whether it's bullying whether it's other break-ins other little crimes that was
00:41:44
all I guaranteeing you happening before this murder and I'm going to try to go through this without getting too much
00:41:52
more into the details of the actual attack itself be one it's hard to get through and two we've discussed it
00:41:59
pretty well so far unfortunately now Quin Glover did testify that he saw sper physically kill Kimberly Billy Marx
00:42:09
testified that in the light of the full moon that night he could see sper chopping at the people in the bed with
00:42:16
the machete after they turned the light back on he saw Steven sper kick jimie in
00:42:21
the chest and hit her in the head with the machete after G stabbed jimie and threw her sper made him come over and
00:42:30
stab Kimberly a few more times then he went over to jamy and kicked her and struck her with the machete and said
00:42:38
something this is beyond bizarre he stated I'm bored despite this seemingly lacad
00:42:46
isical attitude toward the murders sper later told his buddies that the whole thing was a rush he was euphoric and
00:42:54
felt like he had just gotten off off of a roller coaster he joked about how Kimberly woke up to being hacked with a
00:43:01
machete when he found out that jimie had survived sper turned to Gribble and said
00:43:06
you're an idiot you can't even kill a fifth grader Spader's friend Kyle Fenton testified that that sper bragged about
00:43:14
the killings afterwards as well now the defense did their best to raise questions about who actually did The
00:43:22
Killing and tried to undermine the testimony of the three Witnesses Glover seavoy and Marx they pressed Marx about
00:43:30
boast he had made about stabbing somebody with a knife defense attorneys presented evidence that Glover's weapon
00:43:37
of choice was an axe saying that he posted a photo of himself with one on his Myspace page so they're really just
00:43:46
trying to present the idea that these other three could have done the murder without sper but the defense called No
00:43:55
Witnesses what whatsoever in the course of the trial and sper did not testify in
00:44:00
his own defense and Spader's Behavior prior to and at the trial did not do him any favors he threatened three of the
00:44:09
witnesses testifying against him while they were on the stand this is right in front of the jury testimony from sp's
00:44:17
jailmate a gang member idiot named Chad Landry was probably the most damaging Landry told jurors he and sper would
00:44:27
pass notes or or kites back and forth inside books that they slid down the corridor between their cells Landry was
00:44:37
no dummy and he saw an opportunity he pretended to flush the notes down the toilet knowing sper could
00:44:45
hear it but he actually kept these notes and contacted authorities to use the letters as leverage to get himself a
00:44:53
reduced sentence these letters were gold for the prosecutors since sper had not confessed to the crimes Landry read some
00:45:03
of these notes on the stand sper wrote to Landry that he whacked the mother 36 times and that he could see brains and
00:45:13
lots of blood and that her eyeball was hanging out of its socket it was such an adrenaline rush he
00:45:20
wrote I almost hit Gribble with the machete in one of the letters sper called himself the most sick and twisted
00:45:28
person you will ever meet he said that he found torture highly enjoyable death doesn't frighten me blood excites me he
00:45:38
wrote I've got more [ __ ] wrong in my brain than you can think of but such is life another letter explained how he
00:45:46
wanted to start a crew or Brotherhood and he set up the home invasion as a test to see if his friends had the guts
00:45:54
to do it I mean what up piece of work well this testimony right here is really the slam dunk for the prosecution
00:46:03
because we have all these other people who are saying yes this is the things that sper was saying before and the
00:46:10
actions he was doing before the murders this is what he did at the crime scene when he killed Kimberly and these are
00:46:19
the things that he was saying afterwards this guy's testimony is different in the
00:46:23
sense that they are presenting notes in Spader's own handwriting confirming all of the things that these people are
00:46:32
saying right so now not only are his friends turning against him and confessing now we have basically a
00:46:40
written confession confirming those confessions so the jurors only deliberated for 90 minutes and well
00:46:47
that's because they also went out to lunch uh before they decided sper was convicted on all counts on his 19
00:46:56
birthday remember this is where he made the joke about the jury singing him happy birthday the state's sentencing
00:47:05
memo says his attack was calculated vicious and unprovoked sper was determined to find a house render the
00:47:13
occupants unconscious get Bank numbers large sums of money torture the residents in the house and eventually
00:47:20
kill every member of the family as described in the sentencing memo under New Hampshire law he was sentenced to
00:47:29
mandatory life without parole on the first-degree murder charge and the court imposed a consecutive maximum sentencing
00:47:37
on the remaining charges which was 76 years but that description of his sentence does not convey The Fury with
00:47:46
which the judge sentenced speder Hillsboro County Superior Court Judge Jillian abenson said I could go on for
00:47:55
days and days and days about the depth of your depravity but it is sufficient to say that you belong in a cage and I
00:48:04
will sentence you to the maximum and you will stay in that cage for the rest of your pointless life and I I wish in a
00:48:12
fair world what they would say is look we're going to put you in this cell for the rest of your life but we're also
00:48:18
going to give jimie the victim that survived we're going to give her a machete and we're going to give her keys
00:48:25
and whenever ever she wants to she could go in there and attack you so have fun sleeping that sounds fair to me but more
00:48:33
than likely she's not the animal that this guy is you know and wouldn't want to cause that level of harm or hurt to
00:48:42
to anyone now Chris Gribble we still got to deal with this guy he he didn't get a
00:48:47
traditional trial and that is because he pled not guilty by reason of insanity to
00:48:53
all of the charges against him under New Hampshire law this means he forfeited his criminal trial instead his lawyers
00:49:01
had to prove to the jury that his actions were the result of a mental disease or defect the question was not
00:49:08
whether he participated he already confessed but whether he did so in his own right mind the judge was the same
00:49:17
one as in the sper case the way this worked is a little complicated but basically if the jury found unanimously
00:49:25
that Gribble's actions were the result of mental disease or defect he would be committed to a psychiatric unit in the
00:49:33
state prison rather than just go to regular prison and he would be entitled to another hearing every 5 years to
00:49:41
determine whether he still presented a danger to society if Gribble's attorneys failed to show that his actions were the
00:49:50
result of mental disease or defect he would be found guilty of murder if this was a unanimous verdict he would be
00:49:58
sentenced to life in prison without parole if neither decision was unanimous it would be a hung jury and Gribble
00:50:05
would be retried at a later date Gribble's attorneys argued that he suffered from antisocial personality
00:50:13
disorder and all sorts of witnesses testified either for this point or against it it is interesting to see the
00:50:21
picture painted of this guy by people who knew him he was described as a dork awkward someone who would ramble on
00:50:28
about uninteresting topics he was always misreading social cues and the girls called him creepy Chris some testified
00:50:38
that he was very smart and nice although he didn't really seem to understand others one mom recalled how he said he
00:50:47
loved her cookies and seemed devoted to his Mormon faith but he also dressed in camo gear all of the time
00:50:56
this might seem weird I guess but he was a US Army Cadet Core group he was in that group so maybe it's not that weird
00:51:08
yeah but sometimes you know with the RC guys people would pick on them because they had to wear uniforms to school
00:51:15
right but I think what they're pointing out here is that he wore this stuff all the time and that in fact is weird but
00:51:20
I'm pointing out he did have a reason or a purpose for wearing it at least some of the time he played Dungeons and
00:51:26
Dragons again that's just a hobby that's weird yeah some people some people say weird that's about as weird as Grand
00:51:32
Theft Auto to me and a lot of people play that and I think Grand Theft Auto is probably even more violent he got
00:51:39
good grades but started to change around 2008 Autumn seavoy you know no saint himself testified that Gribble was Robin
00:51:48
to stevenh sper Batman Gribble's Father Richard testified that his son was intelligent well spoken but that he was
00:51:57
socially awkward and also had a warped world view in which he was always in the right A friend of gribbles told the
00:52:06
Boston Herald that he himself at that he saw himself as a destroying Angel and he
00:52:14
said he hated his father apparently part of his Insanity defense relied on Gribble testifying that he was abused by
00:52:22
his mother Gribble took the stand and admitted that he had fantasized about torturing and killing her from the age
00:52:30
14 on because she was abusive now was it was it Gribble that also said that he was possibly sexually abused when he was
00:52:41
younger uh I didn't get into that I I didn't come across that I thought I saw something about that but
00:52:50
he said this is per an Associated Press article he said quote he fantasized about taking his mother into the woods
00:52:58
and cutting off little pieces of her bit by bit listening to her scream he also said he thought about pouring boiling
00:53:06
water over her sensitive parts and bending her limbs out of joint and sprinkling her with sugar so the crows
00:53:13
would come and pluck at her saying hey if I'm going to kill her why not make her pay but his father testified that
00:53:22
his parents were loving not abusive and in fact his son gave him a black eye in the course of an
00:53:31
altercation his mother said all she had done was once when he was five Whack Him
00:53:37
on the back with a wooden spoon there was no abuse other Witnesses testified that Gribble's parents were very patient
00:53:45
with him very involved homeschooling him and supporting him by participating in the Boy Scouts and participating in
00:53:54
Dungeons and dragons with him Richard was an EMT his father and Cub Scout and later troop leader volunteering so his
00:54:03
son could obtain Eagle Scout rank as described in an article in the nashille telegraph Richard Gribble said he and
00:54:11
his wife tried to teach their son right from wrong and to instill a set of values in him Assistant Attorney General
00:54:19
Peter Henley asked him if he thought they had succeeded and said given the fact that he's admitted to committing
00:54:28
two very heinous crimes I'd say no his father testified that the machete and the knife used on Kimberly and jimie
00:54:36
were taken from his home before the attack and he did not know this until after his son was
00:54:42
arrested Gribble's Facebook page was found to reflect that he considered himself a devout Mormon who love God and
00:54:50
a gun and knife Enthusiast he wrote on his page although everyone has a light and dark Dark Side mine are very extreme
00:54:57
if I like you or at least don't dislike you I'm the sweetest nicest person ever but Heaven Help me if I truly lose it
00:55:07
it's not pretty in a different post he referenced a hit list that contained seven people whom he said he hated the
00:55:15
most chilling part on his Facebook page at 11 a.m. on Sunday October 4th just hours after the attack on jimie and
00:55:24
Kimberly Kates he wrote I had an awesome time with Steve and Autumn Dexter is such a funny show well I think they're
00:55:32
downfall is they're trying to claim that he's insane right mhm but it's not just
00:55:40
insane at the time of the murder it's just insane in general but they put him on the stand
00:55:48
and I think this is actually a problem for them because he he is very well spoken yeah he took the stand at trial
00:55:55
and testified about the attacks he admitted that he and sper intended to kill anyone they found in the home that
00:56:02
they chose to burglar rise he even demonstrated how he had held the knife as he used it on the victims and he
00:56:09
testified that he wanted to shoot people and he was not certain that he would not
00:56:13
kill again if he was given the opportunity and described himself as dangerous on the
00:56:21
stand I think the thing here is from a defense side or at least from this guy's you
00:56:29
know this gribbles what what he's hoping for he doesn't really have a whole lot to lose right worst case scenario he
00:56:37
ends up getting life in prison without the possibility of parole which is what he's going to get if he's found guilty
00:56:45
regardless so why not try to you know poop your pants and rub it all over your face in front of the jury maybe he maybe
00:56:52
he could have put it on a little bit better I think is what you're pointing out here now the prosecution had experts
00:56:59
including a psychiatrist who interviewed Gribble for several hours and these experts testified that Gribble was in
00:57:08
fact sane he knew the difference between right and wrong and prosecutors pointed
00:57:13
out that Gribble had been sane enough to plot the crime try to cover it up and try to hide evidence and lie about his
00:57:21
involvement the jury rejected Chris Gribble's Insanity claim and declared him guilty of two counts of first-degree
00:57:30
murder attempted murder conspiracy to commit murder conspiracy to commit burglary and witness tampering they
00:57:37
deliberated for only 2 hours it seems like their lunch was a little bit longer than the previous
00:57:44
jury our brave resilient Survivor Jamie by this time is still just 12 years old she was in fact in the courtroom for
00:57:54
this trial she was not asked to testify her father David gave a victim impact statement as he had done in Spader's
00:58:04
trial as well and thanked the judge for being impartial throughout the trial the
00:58:11
judge thanked Jaimie for her presence in the courtroom saying it was nice to finally get the chance to meet her the
00:58:18
judge assured her that the men involved in this horrible crime could never hurt her again then she almost happily
00:58:27
imposed the mandatory sentence of life without parole telling Gribble Infinity is not enough jail time for you she
00:58:36
added a sentence of 50 Years to Life plus a maximum of an additional 52 years on other charges but how impressive is
00:58:46
that that she was able to one she lives through the attack she recovers but to have the strength to show up and face
00:58:55
the attackers in court at 12 years old that's that's pretty baller Billy Marx agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to
00:59:03
commit murder and burglary and to being an accomplice to first deegree assault in exchange for a reduced sentence Marx
00:59:12
was sentenced to 30 to 60 years his sentence was in fact a stiff one because he admitted to helping plan the crime
00:59:23
there are some interesting things within this portion of the story though Captain
00:59:27
because remember sper defense lawyers they actually tried to pin the crime the murder on Marx they emphasized that Marx
00:59:37
had been alone in the house with the victims for some time on that night this was when he climbed into the basement
00:59:45
before the others got into the house they implied that he had perhaps done the killing on his own before the rest
00:59:53
of them got into the house the other interesting thing about Marx 2 is this is the only bit where I could find that
01:00:02
any of the five at one point said ho ho ho wait a second maybe this is not such a good idea you know everybody else
01:00:09
seemed to be going along with this all the way so what we found here was text messages Mark actually texted speder
01:00:20
that they should wait to rob a house until the family that occupied the home was not at home that I guess he's trying
01:00:30
to deter them from attacking and killing everyone in the house like sper said that they wanted to do now
01:00:39
unfortunately and to discredit Marx that's not what happened and he went along with this whole nightmare of a
01:00:49
plan Quinn Glover was charged with only robbery burglary and conspiracy to commit burglary on condition that he
01:00:59
would plead guilty to all of those charges and testify against all of the others he was sentenced to 20 to 40
01:01:07
years his shorter sentence was due to prosecutors recognition of the fact that he was the first one in the group to
01:01:17
cooperate with police and start telling them what actually happened and who did what now what happened to
01:01:25
the one that wasn't there Autumn seavoy plad guilty only to charges of hindering
01:01:30
apprehension and conspiracy in exchange he got a sentence of 5 to 12 years in prison he was in
01:01:38
fact paroled in 2015 that brings us Captain to the sentencing review this took place in
01:01:46
June of 2012 and this was a US Supreme Court decision uh handed down with a ruling in
01:01:53
the mil V Alabama case which required the sentence given to Steven sper to be reviewed this is because he's a minor
01:02:03
and he received a sentence of life without parole we're not going to get too much into the minutia of the
01:02:09
legality of all this bit what does happen is he by his own rights gets this review he decides that he does not want
01:02:22
to be reviewed he does not want his sentence reduced or changed in any manner he refused to cooperate he would
01:02:30
not allow himself to be transported to court for any of the hearings regardless if he wants to participate in this
01:02:38
review or not it's going to have to happen per the law so he's not there to argue his side however someone will
01:02:46
argue his side for him basically the prosecution is going to make all of the arguments that they made pre previously
01:02:55
this guy's a psychopath he's admitted to killing people he's a violent offender he deserves the sentence that he got we
01:03:02
should not change anything but what is interesting in this whole bit of legal proceedings is that this is when it came
01:03:11
out about the evaluations of speder in regards to his having been adopted sper was adopted at only 5 days old from a
01:03:22
mother who had substance abuse problems baby Steven tested positive for marijuana and cocaine when he was born
01:03:31
and then in 2018 he starts having all of these problems that we talked about leading up
01:03:38
to the murder right it's worth asking the question was sper predetermined to be a violent offender or violent killer
01:03:47
because of his exposure to drugs in utero the court during these proceedings did not seem to consider this to be a
01:03:56
factor in their sentencing process the court also took into consideration sper statement of regret delivered by his
01:04:04
attorneys in court this is basically his statement of refusing to go along with this procedure but also stating that he
01:04:14
was in fact sorry for the crimes that he committed and the harm that he had done
01:04:21
the sentencing judge was not swayed the Court says that they find these sentiments self-serving disingenuous and
01:04:29
inconsistent with the defendants true regret the judge ruled that sper will forever be a danger to society the court
01:04:37
exercises Its Right of discretion toward sentencing the defendant to life without
01:04:43
parole they upheld the sentence that was originally handed down for this guy there was also a nasty poem that was
01:04:53
presented at his trial his original trial that he wrote and it shows very it shows no Talent at all as far as being a
01:05:03
riter but it really just goes along with him proclaiming to his his jailmate that
01:05:11
he's this horrible despicable monster who enjoyed killing someone and would kill again in June of
01:05:20
2011 the New Hampshire Governor signed a bill expanding the state's death penalty
01:05:25
to cover murders committed during burglaries and home invasions this law was passed as a direct result of the
01:05:33
katees murder the bill was named after Kimberly Kates house Speaker William O'Brien said our homes are our sanctuary
01:05:41
and this was a necessary enhancement of protection for those in their homes who have the right to be safe and secure
01:05:49
Jaimie is now in college her dad has been her supporter every step of the way and the two remain very close they still
01:05:58
live in the house on tro Road each year on the anniversary of the attack David Kates host a golf tournament to raise
01:06:07
money for a scholarship in his wife's name many of the police officers and prosecutors who worked on the case
01:06:14
participate the four young men who invaded the Kate's home and carried out their despicable Thrill Kill will spend
01:06:22
a significant part if not all of their lives in prison the town of Mount Vernon New Hampshire is forever changed by
01:06:31
their actions it's a small comfort that these young men are put away but it's deeply disturbing that these promising
01:06:39
young people who were given every privilege in life and were members of mainstream communities found each other
01:06:47
fed on each other and together carried out their darkest urges [Music] [Applause]
01:06:57
[Music] thank you guys so much for tuning in to True Crime garage and spending your time
01:07:10
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