Grand Rapids
Man found fit for trial in abduction of girl who was slain
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) — A man previously found incompetent has been ordered to stand trial on a kidnapping charge in the abduction of a 16-year-old who was killed in 2018, a prosecutor said Tuesday.
A U.S. Bureau of Prisons forensic psychologist found evidence to suggest Gerald Bennett, 63, of Detroit, was faking symptoms so he could be found incompetent to stand trial, so U.S. Magistrate Judge Ray Kent ordered Bennett to stand trial on a charge of kidnapping a minor, U.S. Attorney Mark Totten said.
The partially clothed body of Mujey Dumbuya was found in January 2018 in woods in Kalamazoo, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) southeast of her Grand Rapids home. She had been strangled. Bennett hasn’t been charged with killing her.
After Bennett initially was found incompetent to stand trial, state charges against him were dismissed and he was freed in March 2022, Totten said. The case then was referred to the FBI and federal prosecutors, and a federal grand jury indicted him last August.
If convicted, Bennett faces a minimum term of 20 years and a maximum of life in prison, Totten said.
A telephone message seeking comment was left Tuesday evening for Bennett’s attorney.
A co-defendant, Quinn James, was convicted of killing Dumbuya and sentenced to life in prison without parole, Totten said.
Dumbuya was supposed to testify at trial in April 2018 that James had sexually assaulted her.
Grand Rapids
Man who killed mom, 2 sisters as a teen to get new sentence
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) — A western Michigan man serving a life sentence for killing his mother and two sisters when he was a teenager will get a shorter prison term and an opportunity for freedom, a judge said Tuesday.
Kent County Judge Mark Trusock said he will sentence Jon Siesling to a term of years June 8. The judge could have stayed with a life sentence.
Siesling was 17 in 2003 when he bludgeoned and stabbed his mother and also killed his sisters, ages 6 and 15, at their Walker home, near Grand Rapids.
He was convicted of first-degree murder and automatically given a life sentence with no chance for parole. Decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court and Michigan Supreme Court have given so-called juvenile lifers an opportunity to win release.
Siesling’s new minimum sentence would be somewhere from 25 years to 40 years, which would then qualify him for review by the state parole board. He will get credit for 20 years already served.
“He’s changed,” Tina Olson, attorney for Siesling, told the judge last week. “His remorse, his horror for what he did to his family is real and enduring.”
In 2003, Siesling’s trial lawyers said he suffered from depression and dissociative identity disorder, formerly known as multiple personality disorder.
Arizona
Inmate sentenced to death again in cellmate’s murder
PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona man has been sentenced to death for the second time in the 2010 murder of his prison cellmate, who was castrated and had his throat slit.
In the first Arizona capital case to be brought back for a do-over since twin U.S. Supreme Court rulings earlier this year, a Maricopa County Superior Court jury deliberated for about one hour Monday before upholding Jasper Rushing’s sentence.
Judge Michael Kemp, who sentenced Rushing the first time in the murder of 40-year-old Shannon Palmer, told jurors they had to decide if there was any evidence presented during last week’s new sentencing phase that warranted leniency toward Rushing.
The Arizona Republic reported Rushing didn’t present any evidence of that kind to the courtroom.
Rushing being found guilty of first-degree murder in Palmer’s death could not play a roll in the jury’s sentencing decision, according to the newspaper. Rushing, 42, was found guilty of first-degree murder and first sentenced to death in 2015.
Prosecutors said Rushing put a softcover book inside a sock and bludgeoned Palmer at the Lewis Prison Complex in Buckeye, then slit the victim’s throat multiple times and cut off his penis with a razor blade.
Rushing was convicted of theft and drug possession, as well as the 2001 murder of his former stepfather, for which at the time of Palmer’s murder he was serving life with the possibility of release after 25 years.
Rushing was the last of four capital defendants whose cases went back to Maricopa County because of a 2016 U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
Earlier this year, the high court upheld for a third time that Arizona was ignoring the 30-year legal precedent that gives defendants the right to tell juries that if they were sentenced to life, they would not be eligible for release.
Rushing’s case now goes to the Arizona Supreme Court for an automatic appeal. As of Tuesday, there were 109 inmates on the state’s death row.
Detroit
Ex-police commander sentenced in towing bribe scheme
DETROIT (AP) — A former lieutenant in charge of the Detroit Police Department’s Integrity Unit was sentenced to two and a half years in prison Tuesday for accepting bribes in a conspiracy with another officer, prosecutors announced.
John F. Kennedy, 57, of Rochester Hills, worked within the department’s Internal Affairs Division and was responsible for investigating reports of crimes and professional misconduct by police and other city employees, U.S. Attorney Dawn Ison said.
Kennedy conspired with fellow Officer Daniel S. Vickers to commit bribery by accepting nearly $15,000 in exchange for using his influence to persuade other officers to make tow referrals to a company, Ison said. Kennedy pleaded guilty under an agreement with prosecutors.
Evidence in the case included secretly recorded phone conversations in which referrals were steered to a company that was not on the department’s rotation list.
Such work can be lucrative: Towing companies can charge storage fees until a car is claimed and even sell a vehicle at auction after a certain period.
Vickers, 54, accepted more than $3,400 in payments from a towing company in 2018, authorities said. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced last month to two years and three months in prison.
Six people have been charged as part of the federal government’s investigation.
City Councilman Andre Spivey pleaded guilty in 2021 to accepting $36,000 in bribes related to oversight of towing policy. Spivey resigned.
Vermont
Man convicted by jury of kidnapping woman and son
BURLINGTON, Vt. (AP) — A 45-year-old man was convicted by a jury Tuesday of kidnapping a woman and her 4-year-old son by forcing them into her car outside a New Hampshire mall and bringing them to Vermont while he was searching for his estranged wife.
The Vermont office of the United States Attorney said the federal court jury returned the guilty verdicts against Everett Simpson on two counts of kidnapping and two counts of interstate car theft. The case went to the jury earlier Tuesday.
“Although the harms suffered by Everett Simpson’s victims are indelible, today’s across-the-board guilty verdict represents a significant step in holding Everett Simpson responsible for the heinous crimes he committed on Jan. 5, 2019,” the statement said.
Simpson faces a minimum of 20 years in prison and could be sentenced to life. Sentencing will come at a later date.
Simpson admitted before the jury on Monday that he left a Vermont drug treatment center shortly after he was dropped off there on the night of Jan. 4, 2019, for court-ordered substance abuse treatment from another case.
He stole a van parked in a nearby driveway and drove it to Manchester, New Hampshire, where it was abandoned the next day. Simpson acknowledged driving back to White River Junction, Vermont, with the alleged victim and her son in her car. But he said the woman had agreed to do so and that she had opportunities to leave had she wanted.
The woman and her child were taken to a Vermont motel. Simpson then took the victim’s car to Pennsylvania, where he was eventually arrested.
Court documents say the victim was sexually assaulted while in the motel, but the federal charges did not include sexual assault. Simpson is, however, facing separate state sexual assault charges.
Simpson said he fled the treatment center because he was trying to find his estranged wife, who he believed was having a relationship with another man.
In 2020, the woman received $400,000 in the settlement of a lawsuit accusing the state of Vermont of not doing enough to find Simpson after he left the treatment center. In court last week, the woman said she had received a sizable settlement from the treatment center, but the exact amount is unclear.
Florida
Felon sentenced after posing with gun in Instagram video
FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) — A convicted felon in Florida who appeared in a social media post holding a handgun was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in federal prison.
Terry Kristopher Flournoy, 23, was sentenced Friday in Fort Myers federal court, according to court records. He pleaded guilty in December to illegally possessing a firearm.
Fort Myers police officers arrested Flournoy in April 2020 on an active arrest warrant after he posted a video on Instagram at a local restaurant, according to court documents. That same day, prosecutors said Flournoy posted another video on social media of himself pointing what appeared to be a Glock pistol at the camera.
During Flournoy’s arrest, officers said they located a loaded Glock, and Flournoy’s fingerprint was later recovered from the gun’s magazine.
As a convicted felon, Flournoy is prohibited from possessing a firearm or ammunition under federal law, prosecutors said. Flournoy’s felony convictions include vehicle theft, firearm theft and burglary, according to Florida Department of Corrections records.
Virginia
Reenactor pleads guilty to placing pipe bomb at battlefield
HARRISONBURG, Va. (AP) — A Civil War reenactor has pleaded guilty to charges that he planted a pipe bomb at a Virginia battlefield in 2017 and wrote letters falsely claiming that antifa protesters were to blame.
Prosecutors on Tuesday announced the guilty plea from Gerald Leonard Drake, 63, of Winchester.
Drake admitted during a hearing Monday in federal court in Harrisonburg that he planted a pipe bomb at Cedar Creek Battlefield during an annual reenactment in October 2017. The bomb did not detonate, but it resulted in cancellation of the reenactment after its discovery.
Drake was a Civil War reenactor who regularly participated in events at Cedar Creek until he was expelled from his unit in 2014.
He also admitted writing letters in 2017 and 2018 in which he falsely portrayed himself as part of a group of antifa activists who were targeting the reenactments because they believed them to glorify slavery. The letters threatened violence at subsequent Cedar Creek reenactments as well as an annual Remembrance Day Parade in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
“This defendant sought to intimidate and harm innocent people, and further, he tried to sow discontent by falsely claiming that the attempted bombing was politically motivated,” said U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Virginia Christopher Kavanaugh, whose office prosecuted the case.
