#steven spader

[rapturousrot]

Secretary (2002) dir. Steven Shainberg

[fletchermarple]

Mont Vernon Murder

Kimberly Cates (42) was a spirited, beloved nurse who became the victim of one of the most horrific home invasions in the last decade. The night of October 4, 2009, Kim’s husband Dave was away on a business trip and she was sharing her bed with her then 11 year old daughter Jaimie.

Sounds alerted Kim that someone was in the house, but it was already too late. Four teenagers had broken into the isolated home in the quiet town of Mont Vernon, New Hampshire. Steven Spader (17) was carrying a machete and Christopher Gribble (19) a knife, and they proceeded to attack the two women while their companions William Marks (18) and Quinn Glover (17) watched.

The gruesome details of the attack were told during trial. Kim was hacked to death, suffering at least 32 devastating wounds while trying to shield her daughter. She ended up dying of massive blood loss. Jaimie’s skull was cracked, her jaw bone broken and her foot almost severed, and feigned death while the blows came down. Somehow she managed to survive and call 911 once the killers left.

Spader and his group, who according to the prosecution called themselves Disciples of Destruction and were doing a thrill kill, were caught in less than a day. Both Spader and Gribble had visited a friend after the murders to brag about what they’d done, and the friend ended up calling the police. Marks and Glover agreed to testify against them in exchange for reduced sentences. Although Spader pleaded not guilty and his lawyer said there wasn’t physical evidence tying him to the crime, his own gloating was used against him. While awaiting trial, he had written letters to a fellow inmate describing the murder of Kim in specific and shocking detail, and had called himself “the most sick and twisted person you’ll ever meet.”

Spader was sentenced to life plus 76 years and later forbade his lawyers to appeal the sentence, claiming he chose to accept responsibility for his actions. He also chose not to be present in that hearing and his lawyer read a generic apology letter in his name, one that Dave Cates considered “insulting”, given the circumstances. Gribble was also sentenced to life in prison. Marks got 30-60 years and Glover 20-40 years. A friend of the group called Autumn Savoy got 5 to 12 years for helping them hide evidence.

All convicted young men came from solid backgrounds, and the community was shaken by the crime. It was later revealed that Spader, the mastermind of the attacks, had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder a year before the crimes, and that his parents, who adopted him when he was 5, had looked for professional help for him. Psychiatrists that evaluated him said he was obsessed with his own infamy, which also explains why he didn’t want a lower sentence. Prosecutor Jeffery Stelzin said about him: “This is a case of someone who made a conscious decision to go out and randomly attack and kill innocent people. He was not unintelligent; he was not abused. He had many opportunities and many of the luxuries of life that other people don't have. He was well-equipped to make rational and certainly logical and legal decisions. And he chose not to."

[darknessprevails-blog1]

[painful-like]

Steven Spader was a month shy of his 18th birthday when he orchestrated the home invasion in Mont Vernon, New Hampshire on October 4, 2009, in which Kimberly Cates was killed and her 11-year-old daughter, Jaimie, was hacked and stabbed to near death.