Post by SoulTrainOz on Jun 25, 2006 21:50:04 GMT -5
They ambushed Christian Rojas as he returned home from work.
Then, Heather Lavelle and James Savage hogtied him with an extension cord. Literally, like a hog.
They slammed him in the head with brass knuckles. Have you ever seen the damage brass knuckles inflict on the human head? You would turn away in horror.
They placed Rojas in a bathtub, face down, still hogtied. They forced his head under water, beat him and, screaming at him, demanded his money.
This, torture? How could a reasonable person conclude otherwise?
Then came a weird interlude before the grisly finale.
Savage left to purchase crack cocaine he and Lavelle admitted they were addicts while Lavelle stayed in the apartment with Rojas, who was still bound.
Rojas was making desperate noises, loud enough that Lavelle worried it would draw neighbors' attention. She solved this problem by holding a knife to his throat, and he stopped.
When Savage returned, he and Lavelle worked as a team to finish off Rojas. Lavelle forced his head under water, while Savage held him as he struggled.
They stole Rojas' green Saturn, ripped down the East Coast, robbing and stealing.
"We're like Bonnie and Clyde," Lavelle told Savage. Savage would testify: "She thought it was fun."
When they were caught at Nags Head, N.C. a week later, police found Rojas' blood-soaked wallet in the trunk of the car.
The Aug. 25, 2005 killing earned Lavelle and Savage first-degree murder raps, to which both pleaded guilty. County DA Diane Gibbons said she would go for the death penalty. The torture was so slow, deliberate, pitiless.
Rojas was, by those who knew him, a gentle soul. He was 28. He was in America on a visa from Costa Rica. He worked as a computer programmer in Bensalem. He briefly dated Lavelle, a former $140,000-a-year insurance executive, but broke off the relationship when he discovered she was doing drugs.
Even afterward, when Lavelle hit bottom and was homeless, Rojas took her in. He gave her the key to his apartment.
He was homesick and was planning to return to Costa Rica to take a "dream job" with an American company opening an office there, when he was murdered.
All of what I've just told you was testimony heard by Bucks County Judge Rea Boylan, whose job last week was to determine if Lavelle and Savage would live or die.
Courthouse trivia: It would be the 1st time a Bucks County judge imposed death since capital punishment was reinstated in 1977.
Judge Boylan would not break that long record.
After 15 minutes of deliberating, she gave Savage life in prison. Her decision followed a day of testimony in which a psychiatrist and Savage's mother detailed his "traumatic childhood" and "chaotic relationships with women."
After a day of searching case law, the judge gave Lavelle life, too. She admitted that First Assistant DA David Zellis had proven the death-worthy aggravating circumstances of robbery and torture. But Boylan said she gave "great weight" to the fact that Lavelle had no prior record of violence.
I've sat through murder trials. Some killers are drug-addled crazies in the company of other drug-addled crazies when a gun goes off. Some killers are pure evil who richly deserve death.
In the Rojas case, Judge Boylan came eyeball to eyeball with pure evil. She blinked. Twice.
(source: Opinion, J.D. Mullane, Phillyburbs.com)
Then, Heather Lavelle and James Savage hogtied him with an extension cord. Literally, like a hog.
They slammed him in the head with brass knuckles. Have you ever seen the damage brass knuckles inflict on the human head? You would turn away in horror.
They placed Rojas in a bathtub, face down, still hogtied. They forced his head under water, beat him and, screaming at him, demanded his money.
This, torture? How could a reasonable person conclude otherwise?
Then came a weird interlude before the grisly finale.
Savage left to purchase crack cocaine he and Lavelle admitted they were addicts while Lavelle stayed in the apartment with Rojas, who was still bound.
Rojas was making desperate noises, loud enough that Lavelle worried it would draw neighbors' attention. She solved this problem by holding a knife to his throat, and he stopped.
When Savage returned, he and Lavelle worked as a team to finish off Rojas. Lavelle forced his head under water, while Savage held him as he struggled.
They stole Rojas' green Saturn, ripped down the East Coast, robbing and stealing.
"We're like Bonnie and Clyde," Lavelle told Savage. Savage would testify: "She thought it was fun."
When they were caught at Nags Head, N.C. a week later, police found Rojas' blood-soaked wallet in the trunk of the car.
The Aug. 25, 2005 killing earned Lavelle and Savage first-degree murder raps, to which both pleaded guilty. County DA Diane Gibbons said she would go for the death penalty. The torture was so slow, deliberate, pitiless.
Rojas was, by those who knew him, a gentle soul. He was 28. He was in America on a visa from Costa Rica. He worked as a computer programmer in Bensalem. He briefly dated Lavelle, a former $140,000-a-year insurance executive, but broke off the relationship when he discovered she was doing drugs.
Even afterward, when Lavelle hit bottom and was homeless, Rojas took her in. He gave her the key to his apartment.
He was homesick and was planning to return to Costa Rica to take a "dream job" with an American company opening an office there, when he was murdered.
All of what I've just told you was testimony heard by Bucks County Judge Rea Boylan, whose job last week was to determine if Lavelle and Savage would live or die.
Courthouse trivia: It would be the 1st time a Bucks County judge imposed death since capital punishment was reinstated in 1977.
Judge Boylan would not break that long record.
After 15 minutes of deliberating, she gave Savage life in prison. Her decision followed a day of testimony in which a psychiatrist and Savage's mother detailed his "traumatic childhood" and "chaotic relationships with women."
After a day of searching case law, the judge gave Lavelle life, too. She admitted that First Assistant DA David Zellis had proven the death-worthy aggravating circumstances of robbery and torture. But Boylan said she gave "great weight" to the fact that Lavelle had no prior record of violence.
I've sat through murder trials. Some killers are drug-addled crazies in the company of other drug-addled crazies when a gun goes off. Some killers are pure evil who richly deserve death.
In the Rojas case, Judge Boylan came eyeball to eyeball with pure evil. She blinked. Twice.
(source: Opinion, J.D. Mullane, Phillyburbs.com)