Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > World Wide Association of Specialty Programs and Schools (WWASPS)
Trial for a Paradise Cove survivor starts.
Ursus:
Here's the previously mentioned more in-depth article from The Miami Herald; (same) twenty pics at the link (Adobe Flash Player):
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The Miami Herald
Posted on Thursday, 07.22.10
Christopher Sutton found guilty in plot to murder parents
Miami-Dade jurors convicted Christopher Sutton of hatching the murder plot that left his mother dead and his father blind. He will spend the rest of his life in prison.
BY DAVID OVALLE
dovalle@MiamiHerald.com
Minutes after John R. Sutton's adopted son was convicted of masterminding the bloody attack that left Sutton blind and his wife dead, a reporter asked if he still considered Christopher Sutton his son.
He paused, saying finally: "I cannot answer that question.''
At the same time, jailers whisked Christopher Sutton from the courtroom. He passed within a few yards of his father, never giving him so much as a glance.
The heart-wrenching scene capped an emotional three-week trial that left family, jurors and even the judge choked up.
After 10 hours of deliberations over two days, jurors convicted Sutton, 31, on charges of first-degree murder and attempted murder. Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Stanford Blake immediately sentenced Sutton to three life terms.
Sutton did not address the court or shed a tear.
Prosecutors say Sutton, wanting his parent's wealth and still smarting about being sent to an abusive reform school in Samoa, hired a pal to shoot his parents inside their Coral Gables house in August 2004.
As Judge Blake read the guilty verdicts, two jurors cried. So did Melissa Sutton, Sutton's sister. Both were adopted by the Suttons as newborns.
Even Blake, a family court judge who returned to the criminal courthouse to try the case, teared up as he imposed the sentence.
During trial, prosecutors Carin Kahgan and Kathleen Hoague painted Sutton as a brat who dealt drugs, spoke openly of hating his parents, and pushed pal Garrett Kopp into shooting his well-heeled parents.
"We put on a tremendous amount of evidence,'' Kahgan said after the conviction.
The state's winning theory: that Sutton believed he deserved his father's wealth after his parents shipped him off to the Samoan Paradise Cove program, where he spent 29 months in the mid '90s.
Testifying in his own defense, Sutton cried when recounting his arrival at Paradise Cove. Jurors heard that boys there were hogtied, left in cages, forced into hard labor and deprived of food. But Sutton testified that the program eased up after a while, and he came to appreciate his time there.
For prosecutors, hired gunman Kopp was the key witness. He previously pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and accepted a 30-year prison term.
On the stand, Kopp told how he committed the shootings and said he was hired by Sutton, who gave him a gun, showed him how to break into the house and gave the green-light on Aug. 22, 2004.
Mitchell Kopp, his father, who was key in convincing his son to cooperate with prosecutors, stayed for the verdict Wednesday and tearfully shook Melissa Sutton's hand after the verdict.
"Both the families lost a son,'' he said afterward.
Sutton's defense attorney, Bruce Fleisher, had argued that Kopp was a drug-addled burglar who broke into the house on his own looking for a drug stash belonging to Sutton. Jurors did not buy it.
Fleisher said Christopher Sutton thanked him for his work in representing him. "He was upset. He had tears in his eyes. I think everyone had tears in their eyes.''
John Sutton stood up in court but did not directly rip into his son. Instead, with the boom of a seasoned lawyer, he praised Fleisher's professionalism and hailed the prosecutors for putting his son away.
"The state has never seen better,'' said of the prosecutors.
In the hallway afterward, Sutton said he believed the shooting was a "scheme hatched over a long time,'' and insisted he and his wife did their best to educate their adopted son.
"Those other people that went to Samoa, they didn't kill people,'' he said.
Copyright 2010 Miami Herald Media Co.
Ursus:
Comments left for the above article, "Christopher Sutton found guilty in plot to murder parents" (by David Ovalle, 07.22.10, The Miami Herald):
nancydavisl wrote on 07/22/2010 08:13:16 AM:
What a lousy excuse for a human being.....A Samoan school made him do this ? Please.......how about hard core pond scum that he is......ramundo wrote on 07/22/2010 09:52:21 AM:
The s.o.b. should be lethally injected and we will be done with him. There's no place on earth for someone that would kill their parents.gowani wrote on 07/22/2010 11:18:24 AM:
We must all remain responsible for our actions, however provoked we may have been. On the other hand, severe abuse can be regarded as an explantion even if not an excuse. Being hogtied, left in cages, forced into hard labor and being deprived of food qualifies as cruel and unusual punishment. It also qualifies as torture and would be deemed unacceptable even in our most severe centres of incarceration, including Gitmo.
Of course what Sutton did was inexcusable and he must pay for it. But that does not diminish the fact that what his parents did to him was also inexcusable, albeit to a lesser degree. In the end the quesiton remains: Would Sutton have killed his parents if they had never sent him to the 'Samoan paradise'? Nobody will ever know, but the odds are in favor of saying it would probably not have happened.nmfish wrote on 07/22/2010 12:23:58 PM:
A couple of things that were not mentioned but I'm sure were contributing factors to Chris's resentment and anger towards his parents were the gang rapes in Samoa and the fact that his father tried to prevent his release upon his 18th birthday. It's a program for kids but even after he became a legal adult, they didn't want anything to do with him.originalrat2 wrote on 07/22/2010 02:03:57 PM:
gowani, It's people like you who make creatures like this flourish. You make excuses for everything they do except put the blame right where it belongs, on their backs. What his parents did was forced upon them by this creature who wouldn't do anything in an acceptable manner. Upon returning he was still incorrigable and just wanted to live the high life off his parents and use drugs. Well guess what, if he didn't have his mom killed and dad almost killed he would have been doing home invasions and eventually killed someone himself. If we are to swallow your explanation than every serviceman who has been in a war would be considered to be a candidiate to kill relatives and loved ones due to what they experienced and saw. No, gwani, it's more likely your type of pity as misplaced as it is, help caused this. It's not your fault Christopher, we made this happen because we are so mean, Waaaaaaaaa.axl wrote on 07/22/2010 07:58:12 PM:
If ever there was a poster child for abortion rather than adoption, it is Christopher Sutton.anr1929 wrote on 07/23/2010 00:14:23 AM:
--- Quote ---Replying to nmfish (07/22/2010 12:23:58 PM):
"A couple of things that were not mentioned but I'm sure were contributing factors to Chris's resentment and anger towards his parents were the gang rapes in Samoa and the fact that his father tried to prevent his release upon his 18th birthday. It's a program for kids but even after he became a...":
--- End quote ---
No wonder his father tried to prevent his return to the US. Look what happened: mother dead and father blind.[/list]
HenrikKnudsen wrote on 07/23/2010 06:42:34 PM:
Those other people did not kill their parents, but a huge part of them are not alive today because they could not go on in life.
It seems based on statistic that if you want to increase the mortality rate among your children, relatives or simple passers by, then choose a residential program. What about some federal regulation? Some might remember the TV-show "Brat Camp" about a wilderness program in Oregon. This very program was shut down last year because a boy died there.
The camp in Samoa was closed with the help of the consulate out there. The organization which ran the camp in Samoa has got schools shut down in the Czech republic, Mexico (several times), Nevada and Costa Rica. Another school was fined because they ran a kind of diploma mill up in New York.
Residential solutions are deathly and it is time to make laws. If we consider this conviction right then we are talking of a very sick person and if I had a child which was in need of help I would very much like to have abusive treatment programs eliminated so I not by error ends up creating my own death sentence.HenrikKnudsen wrote on 07/23/2010 06:51:36 PM:
I have to add. Over in Texas they just put the needle into a man who had been attending a school run by the same organization which ran the Samoan camp. He went down for killing at least 3 persons.
On Facebook / Myspace you can find tons of stories about alumnis from these school who went into drugs for some time after leaving the school regardless of the fact that they didn't do drugs before.
Something with their therapy went terrible wrong. Time Magazine published some research that people who receive therapy with drug users can end up wanting to do drugs if the therapy are not done with outmost care. The executed guy from Texas was drug user. Sutton is named to be drug user. Is there a pattern?bromah wrote on 07/23/2010 07:00:19 PM:
Knowing all parties involved Sutton was a pot head but not a user of hard core drugs in any way. Kopp however was a heavy user of anything he could get his hands on. Chris did not hate his family in any way beyond how you or I feel when aggravated by our parents. His father is a vindictive man however and probably blames him for bringing that dark day to their house.
I do not feel that the conviction was justice done but instead has destroyed the life of a person I don't mind calling a friend.
Ask yourself this question. If you were capable of killing your parents, going as far as to higher someone to do so. If your hitman botched a murder, then lost the gun to the police why wouldn't you simply erase the individual. If Sutton was the man they had made him out to be how did that boy Kopp survive long enough to get to testify against you? Especially with 6 months available to do it.bromah wrote on 07/23/2010 07:04:03 PM:
--- Quote ---Replying to originalrat2 (07/22/2010 02:03:57 PM):
"gowani, It's people like you who make creatures like this flourish. You make excuses for everything they do except put the blame right where it belongs, on their backs. What his parents did was forced upon them by this creature who wouldn't do anything in an acceptable manner. Upon returning he...":
--- End quote ---
sorry sir you know nothing of the particulars. perhaps you should actually read the details of this case before commenting. while you are at it go and read about paradise cove, the place that would feed teenagers nothing but bowls of rice, hog tie them and leave them in a shed in the sun if they misbehaved or would beat a person into submission. forced exercise is nothing to what they actually did there.[/list]
o3o2 wrote on 07/26/2010 01:31:35 AM:
--- Quote ---Replying to gowani (07/22/2010 11:18:24 AM):
"We must all remain responsible for our actions, however provoked we may have been. On the other hand, severe abuse can be regarded as an explantion even if not an excuse. Being hogtied, left in cages, forced into hard labor and being deprived of food qualifies as cruel and unusual punishment. It...":
--- End quote ---
You seem to avoid the fact that Christopher must have done something to get put into this Paradise Cove programme in Samoa. Were his parents at their wits end with him and had found no other solution to his behaviour? Behaviour that presumably got him placed into Paradise Cove? He sounds like a bad egg that could not get out of his own way to help himself.[/list]
Copyright 2010 Miami Herald Media Co.
Anne Bonney:
My comment in blue
--- Quote from: "Ursus" ---Here's the previously mentioned more in-depth article from The Miami Herald; (same) twenty pics at the link (Adobe Flash Player):
-------------- • -------------- • --------------
The Miami Herald
Posted on Thursday, 07.22.10
Christopher Sutton found guilty in plot to murder parents
Miami-Dade jurors convicted Christopher Sutton of hatching the murder plot that left his mother dead and his father blind. He will spend the rest of his life in prison.
BY DAVID OVALLE
dovalle@MiamiHerald.com
Minutes after John R. Sutton's adopted son was convicted of masterminding the bloody attack that left Sutton blind and his wife dead, a reporter asked if he still considered Christopher Sutton his son.
He paused, saying finally: "I cannot answer that question.''
At the same time, jailers whisked Christopher Sutton from the courtroom. He passed within a few yards of his father, never giving him so much as a glance.
The heart-wrenching scene capped an emotional three-week trial that left family, jurors and even the judge choked up.
After 10 hours of deliberations over two days, jurors convicted Sutton, 31, on charges of first-degree murder and attempted murder. Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Stanford Blake immediately sentenced Sutton to three life terms.
Sutton did not address the court or shed a tear.
Prosecutors say Sutton, wanting his parent's wealth and still smarting about being sent to an abusive reform school in Samoa, hired a pal to shoot his parents inside their Coral Gables house in August 2004.
As Judge Blake read the guilty verdicts, two jurors cried. So did Melissa Sutton, Sutton's sister. Both were adopted by the Suttons as newborns.
Even Blake, a family court judge who returned to the criminal courthouse to try the case, teared up as he imposed the sentence.
During trial, prosecutors Carin Kahgan and Kathleen Hoague painted Sutton as a brat who dealt drugs, spoke openly of hating his parents, and pushed pal Garrett Kopp into shooting his well-heeled parents.
"We put on a tremendous amount of evidence,'' Kahgan said after the conviction.
The state's winning theory: that Sutton believed he deserved his father's wealth after his parents shipped him off to the Samoan Paradise Cove program, where he spent 29 months in the mid '90s.
Testifying in his own defense, Sutton cried when recounting his arrival at Paradise Cove. Jurors heard that boys there were hogtied, left in cages, forced into hard labor and deprived of food. But Sutton testified that the program eased up after a while, and he came to appreciate his time there. The kid was hogtied and stuck in a cage, but "came to appreciate his time there". Sound familiar? Stockholm Syndrome???
For prosecutors, hired gunman Kopp was the key witness. He previously pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and accepted a 30-year prison term.
On the stand, Kopp told how he committed the shootings and said he was hired by Sutton, who gave him a gun, showed him how to break into the house and gave the green-light on Aug. 22, 2004.
Mitchell Kopp, his father, who was key in convincing his son to cooperate with prosecutors, stayed for the verdict Wednesday and tearfully shook Melissa Sutton's hand after the verdict.
"Both the families lost a son,'' he said afterward.
Sutton's defense attorney, Bruce Fleisher, had argued that Kopp was a drug-addled burglar who broke into the house on his own looking for a drug stash belonging to Sutton. Jurors did not buy it.
Fleisher said Christopher Sutton thanked him for his work in representing him. "He was upset. He had tears in his eyes. I think everyone had tears in their eyes.''
John Sutton stood up in court but did not directly rip into his son. Instead, with the boom of a seasoned lawyer, he praised Fleisher's professionalism and hailed the prosecutors for putting his son away.
"The state has never seen better,'' said of the prosecutors.
In the hallway afterward, Sutton said he believed the shooting was a "scheme hatched over a long time,'' and insisted he and his wife did their best to educate their adopted son.
"Those other people that went to Samoa, they didn't kill people,'' he said.
Copyright 2010 Miami Herald Media Co.
--- End quote ---
DannyB II:
--- Quote from: "Anne Bonney" ---My comment in blue
--- Quote from: "Ursus" ---Here's the previously mentioned more in-depth article from The Miami Herald; (same) twenty pics at the link (Adobe Flash Player):
-------------- • -------------- • --------------
The Miami Herald
Posted on Thursday, 07.22.10
Christopher Sutton found guilty in plot to murder parents
Miami-Dade jurors convicted Christopher Sutton of hatching the murder plot that left his mother dead and his father blind. He will spend the rest of his life in prison.
BY DAVID OVALLE
dovalle@MiamiHerald.com
Minutes after John R. Sutton's adopted son was convicted of masterminding the bloody attack that left Sutton blind and his wife dead, a reporter asked if he still considered Christopher Sutton his son.
He paused, saying finally: "I cannot answer that question.''
At the same time, jailers whisked Christopher Sutton from the courtroom. He passed within a few yards of his father, never giving him so much as a glance.
The heart-wrenching scene capped an emotional three-week trial that left family, jurors and even the judge choked up.
After 10 hours of deliberations over two days, jurors convicted Sutton, 31, on charges of first-degree murder and attempted murder. Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Stanford Blake immediately sentenced Sutton to three life terms.
Sutton did not address the court or shed a tear.
Prosecutors say Sutton, wanting his parent's wealth and still smarting about being sent to an abusive reform school in Samoa, hired a pal to shoot his parents inside their Coral Gables house in August 2004.
As Judge Blake read the guilty verdicts, two jurors cried. So did Melissa Sutton, Sutton's sister. Both were adopted by the Suttons as newborns.
Even Blake, a family court judge who returned to the criminal courthouse to try the case, teared up as he imposed the sentence.
During trial, prosecutors Carin Kahgan and Kathleen Hoague painted Sutton as a brat who dealt drugs, spoke openly of hating his parents, and pushed pal Garrett Kopp into shooting his well-heeled parents.
"We put on a tremendous amount of evidence,'' Kahgan said after the conviction.
The state's winning theory: that Sutton believed he deserved his father's wealth after his parents shipped him off to the Samoan Paradise Cove program, where he spent 29 months in the mid '90s.
Testifying in his own defense, Sutton cried when recounting his arrival at Paradise Cove. Jurors heard that boys there were hogtied, left in cages, forced into hard labor and deprived of food. But Sutton testified that the program eased up after a while, and he came to appreciate his time there. The kid was hogtied and stuck in a cage, but "came to appreciate his time there". Sound familiar? Stockholm Syndrome???
For prosecutors, hired gunman Kopp was the key witness. He previously pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and accepted a 30-year prison term.
On the stand, Kopp told how he committed the shootings and said he was hired by Sutton, who gave him a gun, showed him how to break into the house and gave the green-light on Aug. 22, 2004.
Mitchell Kopp, his father, who was key in convincing his son to cooperate with prosecutors, stayed for the verdict Wednesday and tearfully shook Melissa Sutton's hand after the verdict.
"Both the families lost a son,'' he said afterward.
Sutton's defense attorney, Bruce Fleisher, had argued that Kopp was a drug-addled burglar who broke into the house on his own looking for a drug stash belonging to Sutton. Jurors did not buy it.
Fleisher said Christopher Sutton thanked him for his work in representing him. "He was upset. He had tears in his eyes. I think everyone had tears in their eyes.''
John Sutton stood up in court but did not directly rip into his son. Instead, with the boom of a seasoned lawyer, he praised Fleisher's professionalism and hailed the prosecutors for putting his son away.
"The state has never seen better,'' said of the prosecutors.
In the hallway afterward, Sutton said he believed the shooting was a "scheme hatched over a long time,'' and insisted he and his wife did their best to educate their adopted son.
"Those other people that went to Samoa, they didn't kill people,'' he said.
Copyright 2010 Miami Herald Media Co.
--- End quote ---
--- End quote ---
Or maybe he made it all up and realized half way into the conversation that the program for his "sick psychopathic ass" wasn't that bad at all.
"Stockholm Syndrome" ya riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight. "The program made me do it".
How about some people are just, "bad to the bone".
Ursus:
--- Quote from: "DannyB II" ---
--- Quote from: "Anne Bonney" ---
--- Quote from: "David Ovalle of The Miami Herald" ---Testifying in his own defense, Sutton cried when recounting his arrival at Paradise Cove. Jurors heard that boys there were hogtied, left in cages, forced into hard labor and deprived of food. But Sutton testified that the program eased up after a while, and he came to appreciate his time there.
--- End quote ---
The kid was hogtied and stuck in a cage, but "came to appreciate his time there". Sound familiar? Stockholm Syndrome???
--- End quote ---
Or maybe he made it all up and realized half way into the conversation that the program for his "sick psychopathic ass" wasn't that bad at all.
"Stockholm Syndrome" ya riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight. "The program made me do it".
How about some people are just, "bad to the bone".
--- End quote ---
Perhaps. And perhaps it was a defense strategy, to minimize the alleged acrimony Christopher Sutton had for his parents. It's not like many lay folk, who have never been to one of these places, are likely to ever understand that kind of anger ... regardless of what the end result may be.
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