Four years after two young siblings were killed and their bodies left along rural roads in Mobile and neighboring Jackson County, Mississippi, their father is set to stand trial on capital murder charges this week, closing out a legal process marked by years of delay.
Jury selection was expected to take about a week in the case, which has drawn intense local attention since the children went missing in late 2010. Prosecutors say the defendant and his common-law wife tortured the two children, a young girl and her younger brother, over a period of months before killing them with antifreeze. The couple later relocated to Kentucky, where the woman is accused of alerting police to the children’s deaths only after attempting to seek a restraining order against him.
The case has been delayed repeatedly, largely over the appointment of a new defense team and the need for mitigation specialists required in cases where prosecutors may seek the death penalty. The defendant initially entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity or mental illness, though it remains unclear whether that will remain his defense strategy heading into trial.
Both the prosecution and defense have been under a standing gag order from the presiding circuit judge, limiting public comment on the case. Mobile County’s district attorney has previously accused earlier defense attorneys of delaying proceedings and running up costs associated with transporting witnesses from around the country. A defense request for a change of venue was denied in 2013, though the judge has said the trial could still be relocated if jury selection fails to yield an adequate pool.
According to court records and statements from investigators, the final months of the children’s lives involved severe abuse. Family members reportedly had not seen the children for close to a year before they were reported missing; their mother said she had not seen them since late 2009, as their father held custody. She described her daughter as full of laughter and her son as an outgoing “lady’s man.”
Court documents allege one child was bound with duct tape, gagged and locked inside a suitcase in a closet for roughly 12 hours during one instance of abuse. In another episode, according to the same documents, the boy was restrained upright against a broom with duct tape and gagged while the adults slept. Investigators say the father later told them he buried his son’s remains in Mississippi in the spring, and disposed of his daughter’s body in Alabama that summer.
Both defendants were arrested in December 2010, days after the woman is said to have first disclosed the children’s deaths to police in Kentucky. The children’s remains were discovered separately, in wooded areas near the Mississippi coast and in a rural part of Mobile County, following extensive searches.
The father faces three counts of capital murder. His common-law wife, who also faces two counts of aggravated child abuse, is scheduled to be tried separately next year. Both defendants remain held without bail as the case moves forward this week in Mobile County.