Maryland
Mother of 2 missing children reindicted with their murder
ROCKVILLE, Md. (AP) — A Maryland woman with a long history of severe mental illness has been rearrested and charged with killing two of her children, who disappeared in 2014 as toddlers and have never been found.
The new indictment marks the latest twist in a case that began with the children’s disappearance and subsequent revelations about their mother’s mental state, which resulted in her long hospitalization in a state-run psychiatric facility as she was repeatedly deemed incompetent to stand trial.
Catherine Hoggle, 38, was released from the hospital last month. After her release, a grand jury reindicted her on two counts of first-degree murder, according to the Montgomery County State’s Attorney’s Office. She was arrested Friday.
An email seeking comment was sent to Hoggle’s attorney Monday morning.
Hoggle is scheduled to appear in court Monday afternoon for a bail review hearing.
It’s not clear why she was released from the hospital and whether she was receiving psychiatric treatment in a different capacity since then.
Her children, Sarah and Jacob Hoggle, were ages 3 and 2 respectively when they were last seen in September 2014. Catherine Hoggle also went missing around the same time. The children’s father reported them all missing. Hoggle was found days later, walking in a nearby town. Police said she refused to tell them where the children were.
She was initially arrested and charged with neglect and abduction, both misdemeanors. She was sent to the state-run psychiatric hospital for treatment.
Then in 2017, she was indicted on murder charges. A judge ruled she was incompetent to stand trial and imposed continuing court-ordered treatment. Under state law, authorities had five years to restore her competency before the charges must be dismissed.
Her attorney, David Felsen, has long said she suffers from severe mental illness. She has a history of schizophrenia and was treated with antipsychotic medications after her arrest.
In 2022, a Montgomery County judge dropped the charges against her, citing the five-year time limit. Hoggle was ordered to remain involuntarily committed for psychiatric treatment because she was still considered a danger to herself or others.
Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy said then that if she’s deemed no longer a threat and released, he was prepared to charge her again with murder.
The children’s father, Troy Turner, has acknowledged Hoggle’s mental illness, saying she was acting erratic and paranoid before the children’s disappearance. He told the AP in 2014 that she had started showing signs of psychosis and was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. But he later claimed she was feigning incompetency.
New York
Ex-prison guard sentenced to 15 years for beating death of inmate
UTICA, N.Y. (AP) — A former corrections officer was sentenced to 15 years in prison Monday for his role in the death of a Black inmate whose beating by a group of guards at an upstate New York prison was captured on bodycam videos.
Christopher Walrath was one of six guards charged with murder in the death of Robert Brooks, who was pummeled at the Marcy Correctional Facility on Dec. 9. Walrath pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in May under the first plea deal among the guards charged with murder.
“In that video, I see you and your fellow officers treating him as if his life holds no value at all, as if you’re entitled to brutalize him for sport,” Robert Brooks Jr., the victim’s son, told the court.
The son said in his victim impact statement that, “I am not OK and I never will be.”
Brooks had been serving a 12-year sentence for first-degree assault since 2017 and was transferred to Marcy from a nearby lockup on the night he was beaten. The videos show Brooks being struck in the chest with a shoe, lifted by his neck and then dropped.
Under questioning in May from Onondaga County District Attorney William Fitzpatrick, Walrath admitted that he and other guards assaulted Brooks, that he put Brooks in a chokehold, and that he struck the inmate’s body and groin.
In addition to the six guards charged in February with murder, three more prison workers were indicted for manslaughter and another for evidence tampering. Prosecutors have said three other prison workers have reached agreements.
A guard pleaded guilty in May to attempted tampering with physical evidence and was sentenced to a one-year conditional discharge.
Trials were scheduled to begin in October for guards who have rejected plea deals.
Fitzpatrick also is prosecuting guards in the fatal beating of Messiah Nantwi on March 1 at another Marcy lockup, the Mid-State Correctional Facility. Ten guards were indicted in April, including two who are charged with murder.
Both prisons are about 180 miles (290 kilometers) northwest of New York City.
New Jersey
Gary Busey pleads guilty to sex offense at horror convention
CHERRY HILL, N.J. (AP) — Actor Gary Busey has pleaded guilty to a sexual offense stemming from an appearance at a 2022 horror convention in New Jersey, according to his representatives and court records.
The 81-year-old “Buddy Holly” star’s manager, Ron Sampson, said in an email Friday that the actor admitted to touching a woman’s buttocks “over clothing during an 8-10 second photo op.”
Busey entered a guilty plea to a single count of criminal sexual contact during a virtual hearing in state court in Camden on Thursday.
The actor had been accused of inappropriately touching at least three women at the Monster-Mania Convention at the Doubletree Hotel in Cherry Hill, a South Jersey town and suburb of Philadelphia.
Organizers of the event acknowledged at the time that an unnamed celebrity guest was “removed from the convention and instructed not to return” and that affected attendees were encouraged to contact police.
Busey had been scheduled as a featured guest for all three days of the event. He was initially charged with two counts of fourth-degree criminal sexual contact, one count of attempted criminal sexual contact and one count of harassment.
Busey’s lawyer, Blair Zwillman, confirmed Friday that the other charges were dropped as part of a plea deal reached with prosecutors. The actor faces up to five years’ probation and fines when he is sentenced Sept. 18.
“In my view Mr. Busey was ‘overcharged’ probably based on his star status,” Zwillman said in an email. “He could have just as easily been charged with the disorderly persons offense of harassment by ‘offensive touching’.”
Mother of 2 missing children reindicted with their murder
ROCKVILLE, Md. (AP) — A Maryland woman with a long history of severe mental illness has been rearrested and charged with killing two of her children, who disappeared in 2014 as toddlers and have never been found.
The new indictment marks the latest twist in a case that began with the children’s disappearance and subsequent revelations about their mother’s mental state, which resulted in her long hospitalization in a state-run psychiatric facility as she was repeatedly deemed incompetent to stand trial.
Catherine Hoggle, 38, was released from the hospital last month. After her release, a grand jury reindicted her on two counts of first-degree murder, according to the Montgomery County State’s Attorney’s Office. She was arrested Friday.
An email seeking comment was sent to Hoggle’s attorney Monday morning.
Hoggle is scheduled to appear in court Monday afternoon for a bail review hearing.
It’s not clear why she was released from the hospital and whether she was receiving psychiatric treatment in a different capacity since then.
Her children, Sarah and Jacob Hoggle, were ages 3 and 2 respectively when they were last seen in September 2014. Catherine Hoggle also went missing around the same time. The children’s father reported them all missing. Hoggle was found days later, walking in a nearby town. Police said she refused to tell them where the children were.
She was initially arrested and charged with neglect and abduction, both misdemeanors. She was sent to the state-run psychiatric hospital for treatment.
Then in 2017, she was indicted on murder charges. A judge ruled she was incompetent to stand trial and imposed continuing court-ordered treatment. Under state law, authorities had five years to restore her competency before the charges must be dismissed.
Her attorney, David Felsen, has long said she suffers from severe mental illness. She has a history of schizophrenia and was treated with antipsychotic medications after her arrest.
In 2022, a Montgomery County judge dropped the charges against her, citing the five-year time limit. Hoggle was ordered to remain involuntarily committed for psychiatric treatment because she was still considered a danger to herself or others.
Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy said then that if she’s deemed no longer a threat and released, he was prepared to charge her again with murder.
The children’s father, Troy Turner, has acknowledged Hoggle’s mental illness, saying she was acting erratic and paranoid before the children’s disappearance. He told the AP in 2014 that she had started showing signs of psychosis and was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. But he later claimed she was feigning incompetency.
New York
Ex-prison guard sentenced to 15 years for beating death of inmate
UTICA, N.Y. (AP) — A former corrections officer was sentenced to 15 years in prison Monday for his role in the death of a Black inmate whose beating by a group of guards at an upstate New York prison was captured on bodycam videos.
Christopher Walrath was one of six guards charged with murder in the death of Robert Brooks, who was pummeled at the Marcy Correctional Facility on Dec. 9. Walrath pleaded guilty to first-degree manslaughter in May under the first plea deal among the guards charged with murder.
“In that video, I see you and your fellow officers treating him as if his life holds no value at all, as if you’re entitled to brutalize him for sport,” Robert Brooks Jr., the victim’s son, told the court.
The son said in his victim impact statement that, “I am not OK and I never will be.”
Brooks had been serving a 12-year sentence for first-degree assault since 2017 and was transferred to Marcy from a nearby lockup on the night he was beaten. The videos show Brooks being struck in the chest with a shoe, lifted by his neck and then dropped.
Under questioning in May from Onondaga County District Attorney William Fitzpatrick, Walrath admitted that he and other guards assaulted Brooks, that he put Brooks in a chokehold, and that he struck the inmate’s body and groin.
In addition to the six guards charged in February with murder, three more prison workers were indicted for manslaughter and another for evidence tampering. Prosecutors have said three other prison workers have reached agreements.
A guard pleaded guilty in May to attempted tampering with physical evidence and was sentenced to a one-year conditional discharge.
Trials were scheduled to begin in October for guards who have rejected plea deals.
Fitzpatrick also is prosecuting guards in the fatal beating of Messiah Nantwi on March 1 at another Marcy lockup, the Mid-State Correctional Facility. Ten guards were indicted in April, including two who are charged with murder.
Both prisons are about 180 miles (290 kilometers) northwest of New York City.
New Jersey
Gary Busey pleads guilty to sex offense at horror convention
CHERRY HILL, N.J. (AP) — Actor Gary Busey has pleaded guilty to a sexual offense stemming from an appearance at a 2022 horror convention in New Jersey, according to his representatives and court records.
The 81-year-old “Buddy Holly” star’s manager, Ron Sampson, said in an email Friday that the actor admitted to touching a woman’s buttocks “over clothing during an 8-10 second photo op.”
Busey entered a guilty plea to a single count of criminal sexual contact during a virtual hearing in state court in Camden on Thursday.
The actor had been accused of inappropriately touching at least three women at the Monster-Mania Convention at the Doubletree Hotel in Cherry Hill, a South Jersey town and suburb of Philadelphia.
Organizers of the event acknowledged at the time that an unnamed celebrity guest was “removed from the convention and instructed not to return” and that affected attendees were encouraged to contact police.
Busey had been scheduled as a featured guest for all three days of the event. He was initially charged with two counts of fourth-degree criminal sexual contact, one count of attempted criminal sexual contact and one count of harassment.
Busey’s lawyer, Blair Zwillman, confirmed Friday that the other charges were dropped as part of a plea deal reached with prosecutors. The actor faces up to five years’ probation and fines when he is sentenced Sept. 18.
“In my view Mr. Busey was ‘overcharged’ probably based on his star status,” Zwillman said in an email. “He could have just as easily been charged with the disorderly persons offense of harassment by ‘offensive touching’.”
