CHAPTER 14
The Fatal Phases
It was not an unexpected event when the jury came back in on Tuesday, August 3, 2004, with a verdict of guilty for Justin Alan Helzer in the murders of Ivan Stineman, Annette Stineman and Selina Bishop. They did not find him guilty in the murders of Jennifer Villarin and James Gamble. According to Chris Darden, not one juror would look at Justin while the verdicts were being read. Darden also noted that it was exactly four years to the day since the murders had reached their culmination in the killing of Jennifer Villarin and James Gamble.
After the verdicts had been read, Chris asked Carma Helzer, “How are you doing?” She answered, “Okay. I’ve been dealing with this for four years.”
In fact, many of the court observers, and perhaps even Carma herself, agreed that Daniel Cook was saving his “legal ammunition” for the sanity phase. They basically believed that it was here where the real test of whether Justin Helzer would live or die would occur. The lack of witnesses called by Cook in the guilt phase seemed to confirm their suspicions. They also noted that to be ruled guilty by reason of insanity, in California, a defendant first had to be found guilty of the crime.
As the sanity phase began, Justin wore his usual green sweater and slacks, but he seemed more talkative and animated with his lawyers. His mother, Carma, sat in the second row behind him, looking tired but alert. Gerry, his father, came in later and sat down by her side. Farther down the row, to the left, sat the Stineman daughters and relatives of Selina and Jenny.
Unlike the guilt phase, the defense started opening remarks in the sanity phase. Speaking originally for the defense was Charles Hoehn. He said, “Our hearts go out to the victims’ families. This case is not like any other that I have seen. Mental illness underlies this case.
“I’m here to put the evidence into context. Was Justin Helzer legally insane during the week of July 30, 2000? I believe he was. You’re going to learn about his life and his parents. Twenty-eight years of trying to be a good boy.”
Hoehn spoke of how Taylor was diagnosed with mental illness in 1999, and how his mental state played a factor in Justin’s own mental illness. Hoehn told the jury that they could consider someone’s mental condition before and during the crime. He said, “Justin was always in the shadow of Taylor. Justin was never really loved by Carma. Not the way she loved Taylor.”
Hoehn brought up the Hinckley case, where John Hinckley Jr. so desired Jodie Foster’s affection that he attempted an assassination of President Ronald Reagan. Hoehn compared that to Justin yearning for affection from Taylor. To lose Taylor’s love would be devastating for Justin. He would rather follow Taylor into murder than lose the affection of his older brother.
Hoehn said, “Mental illness is not a choice. Mental illness is a tragedy. Because of Taylor’s beliefs, Justin truly believed he was acting as a warrior for God.”
Hoehn brought up the fact that Justin was pushed by Taylor toward Mark 3:17 of the Bible:
James, the son of Zeb’edee, and John, the brother of James, whom he surnamed Boanerges, that is “Sons of Thunder.”
“Taylor overwhelmed his brother,” Hoehn said. “Justin was only a pair of hands to complement Taylor’s evil plans. According to experts, Justin could not tell right from wrong because of his mental illness. Justin was diagnosed with a shared delusional disorder called folie à deux. This was a shared mental disorder.”
Hoehn explained how Taylor was put on antipsychotic medication in 1999. “He was taking a smorgasbord of drugs. He suffered from grandiose delusions. The shared psychosis between Taylor and Justin was that Taylor was a prophet of God.
“The Church may have left Justin (his excommunication), but Justin never left the LDS Church.”
Hoehn spoke of the Book of Mormon passage that declared that the faithful servant will get his just reward and admittance to the celestial kingdom. Hoehn said that by doing Taylor’s work, Justin believed he would be admitted into the celestial kingdom.
Hoehn also spoke of the great differences between the brothers’ personalities. “Taylor was a Jim Jones–type person. The only male disciple he had, however, was his own brother, who he dominated all his life.”
At this point, Jewett objected to Hoehn’s presentation, stating that Hoehn was doing a closing argument instead of an opening statement. Judge O’Malley tended to agree and said, “You are doing a closing now. You need to tell what your witnesses will say.”
Hoehn had a long conversation with Cook and then continued. Hoehn said, “Brandon Davids said Justin was weak-minded. Another cousin said Justin was mentally ill and that his family treated him as if he was retarded. ‘He was weird, but he didn’t make me nervous like Taylor.’”
Hoehn stated, “This family were extremely devout Mormons until Impact. Justin went to Impact. He had a mental breakdown and began to sleep under the stairs. This is an American tragedy of untreated mental illness.
“Did Justin know what he was doing was illegally wrong? Yes. But [to him], it was to save millions of lives. A divine waiver existed that superseded human lives.
“Justin seemed to be composed, but he was encapsulated with delusions. Attention disorder. Socially antisocial disorder. The mania from Taylor was communicated to Justin.”
In a very real sense, the battle for Justin’s life now would be played out by contending psychiatrists and psychologists. It was their testimony that could sway the jury into believing Justin was either sane or insane. It boiled down to whether Justin had understood the nature of his acts at the time of the crime. Both Jewett and Cook understood the important nature of this phase, and Jewett made several motions to restrict certain admissibility. In one motion, Jewett wanted to question each doctor about how much he had been paid by the defense to interview Justin. Cook argued that the jury wouldn’t understand that being such a long and complicated case meant that the doctors had needed a lot of time to write up their reports after having spent hours with Justin. This led to high costs because of the time spent on those reports.
Judge O’Malley decided that Jewett could ask about the itemized expenses because those went to credibility.
Another motion by Jewett concerned the fact that he had never received any notes from Dr. Dolgoff. Jewett said, “According to Code ten fifty-four, I am entitled to any and all writings of any type, i.e., notes, reports, anything that has to do with the Helzer case. Therefore I cannot effectively nor actively cross-examine someone when I have no idea of their position.”
Cook responded, “Mr. Jewett is full of nonsense, and he knows it. The defense had turned over more than is required by law. I have never received a report from Dr. Dolgoff, therefore I cannot submit something I do not have.”
Dr. Stephen Raffle took the stand for the defense. He had a B.S. in physiology from UC Berkeley, and attended the Chicago School of Medicine and also taught for eleven years at the Hastings School of Law. In his career, he had studied somewhere between three thousand and five thousand cases. In the 1990s, he was an expert witness in ten murder trials.
Jewett asked him during voir dire, “How many times have you testified to the diagnosis of shared delusional disorder?”
Raffle admitted, “Never.”
Hoehn noted that Dr. Raffle had interviewed Justin Helzer five times in jail in 2003, and one time in 2004. After these interviews, Dr. Raffle came to several conclusions about Justin. One was that Justin had a delusional disorder with Axis 1—a current or recent onset of the disorder—and Axis 4—psychosocial stressors, i.e., fired from a job, which brought on depression. He also concluded that Justin was afflicted with the rare but severe shared delusional disorder. Dr. Raffle explained this as being when two people are in an extremely close relationship, and there is one active dominant person. The active person already has a delusional disorder, and the passive person develops the shared delusional disorder so as not to lose the active dominant person from their life.
Dr. Raffle said that Justin lost his own grip on reality when Taylor had a mental breakdown. To prove that Justin was insane, Raffle administered the MMPI test on him, which is the standard psychiatric test worldwide. He also checked to make sure that Justin was not malingering or faking his insanity. To do this, Dr. Raffle compared his notes with four other doctors. All of the reports stated that Justin was telling the truth during interviews.
To further check into the possibility of shared delusional disorder, Dr. Raffle had two meetings with Taylor Helzer in the Martinez County Jail. He noted that Taylor talked very fast, as if he were on meth, even though he hadn’t had any in a while. Taylor couldn’t seem to concentrate on any one subject for any prolonged period of time. Raffle said, “He was restless, nervous and jittery.”
Taylor explained to Dr. Raffle at one point that the way he dealt with voices in his head was by shouting at them. Dr. Raffle concluded that Taylor was a borderline neurotic and psychotic. He also surmised that Taylor’s afflictions had been visited upon Justin’s fragile ego.
Hoehn asked, “How could a person (Justin) with no criminal record, after twenty-eight years, just lose their moral compass?”
Dr. Raffle answered, “Justin became delusional, believing that Taylor was a prophet of God, and that Satan embodied the United States government.”
Hoehn asked why Dr. Raffle’s diagnosis was at odds with portions of those submitted by Dr. Good and Dr. Carol Walzer. Raffle said that those doctors had only seen Justin for two hours, while he had spent thirteen hours with him. Therefore, he had a much clearer idea of the severity of Justin’s mental problems. He also said that neither one of those doctors had obtained a history of Justin’s state of mind directly after the crimes had been committed. Nor had they looked into Justin’s family background. Had they done so, they would have noted that there were mental problems in Justin’s extended family.
One comment by Dr. Raffle was a two-edged sword. He claimed that Justin did understand that what he had done was legally wrong, but he did not understand that it was morally wrong. According to Dr. Raffle’s reading of the California code on insanity, a perpetrator had to understand that what he was doing was both legally and morally wrong.
As for Children of Thunder, Dr. Raffle said the hierarchy of that organization was already familiar to Justin. Justin recognized its similarities to the hierarchy of the Latter-Day Saints Church. It was a hierarchy he could be comfortable with.
On cross-examination, Jewett zeroed in on what he saw as Dr. Raffle’s shortcomings in the process:
Jewett: No tests, no written reports, were viewed by you before Justin’s NGI (not guilty by reason of insanity plea) in October 2003. Is that correct?
Raffle: Yes.
Jewett: So only after Justin entered a NGI plea, is when you began to review reports on Justin’s insanity?
Raffle: True.
Jewett: At any time during the interview, did Justin tell you Taylor was hearing voices?
Raffle: No.
Jewett: In fact, Justin specifically told you that Taylor did not actually hear any voices, but instead they were more like thoughts?
Raffle: Yes.
Jewett made Dr. Raffle confirm many things that Justin had said about Taylor and about his own views as well. Dr. Raffle had noted that Justin said:
“Taylor didn’t really know if the Spirit revelations were true or not. Taylor was weighing it all and using me as a sounding board. There’s no right way, just differences. As an example, a drunk driver who hits a pedestrian is not entirely at fault. The pedestrian put themselves in the way too and was partly to blame. It was a karmic reaction.
“I first thought that Taylor was a little nuts. But then I decided the ends justify the means. Selling dope was okay because it really wasn’t hurting anyone and we needed the money to save America from destruction.
“Killing for greed, laziness or self-indulgence is not right, but killing for God’s work, to better the People, is good. God didn’t command us to kill, but he gave us the green light.”
After Justin was arrested, he admitted, “Being in jail caused me to rethink my beliefs in Taylor. I started to believe my brother wasn’t a prophet of God, but a devil in disguise. Otherwise, things would have turned out okay and we wouldn’t be here in jail.”
The trial on Tuesday, June 29, was delayed on Cook’s request, and for a very good reason. During the late-night hours, around midnight, Justin’s cell was searched and it was discovered that he had been hoarding some medication. When the jailer asked him if he was contemplating suicide, he refused to answer.
According to Cook, deputies removed Justin from his cell and placed him in a padded room. They used leg irons to shackle him to the floor and took away his pillow and blanket. With those items gone, Justin hadn’t slept all night long.
Cook related that Justin kept asking to speak with his lawyer, but he was never granted that privilege. He did speak with his mother sometime around 1:00 A.M., and she called Cook’s office and left a message there.
Cook said, “I find it odd that these interrogators, whatever their motivation, would find the need to hurry to court, and alert the court about this, but at the same time would not call Justin’s lawyer.”
Judge O’Malley interrupted Cook and said, “I don’t know all the facts yet because they are still coming out.”
She paused for a moment and then said, “Mr. Cook, I was just given the incident report by my bailiff. In reading the information in here, it looks like your client was asked a question whether he was suicidal, and your client refused to answer. Martinez County Jail has a policy, when they suspect prisoners may be suicidal, that they take them to a padded room and take away instruments and objects from them, such as a pillow or blanket, so as not to harm themselves in any way.
“All Justin had to do was answer the question. He would have either been in a padded room or remained in his jail cell. Because your client refused to answer the question, the sheriff’s deputies had no choice but to follow protocol and place him in a suicide watch. They checked on him every fifteen minutes, and wrote a brief report every fifteen minutes.
“Even as recent as seven-twenty A.M., the sheriff’s deputies asked if your client was suicidal. He refused to answer the question and stated that he wanted to talk to his lawyer before he answered the question.
“I even gave your client an additional thirty minutes this morning before court, between nine and nine-thirty A.M., to shower and get cleaned up while we were waiting. It turns out that your client refused to shower as well.”
Cook replied, “I am puzzled just as well as the court why someone would refuse to take a shower. But I do know that because Justin was forced to sleep on the floor with shackles around his ankles, without a pillow or blanket, Mr. Helzer (Justin) is very upset and extremely tired, due to not getting any sleep all last night. Because my client is very tired and also very upset, Mr. Helzer is unable to focus on the trial today and cannot listen to the testimony that would be given. Mr. Helzer is also unable to assist his counsel with his defense, due to his tiredness and lack of sleep. I ask the court to delay this trial while I get the rest of the facts and my client’s status changes.”
Judge O’Malley countered, “It is nine-thirty A.M. now. As long as your client refuses to answer the question, then your client’s status is not going to change! This is not something we’re going to be dealing with every day. So I suggest you talk with your client after we recess. I will excuse the jury for today and order them to come back tomorrow at nine A.M.”
Court did resume the next day without the jurors ever knowing what had happened on the previous day. Dr. Raffle admitted that Justin had scored in the top 75 percent of the population on the Wexler IQ test. Raffle also admitted that he had no opinion on what negative effect Impact and Harmony might have had on Justin. He did say, “Justin was a loner and okay by himself. But (Taylor) declared war on Satan. Justin said after that, ‘Soldiers kill, they don’t murder.’ Justin knew it was legally wrong, but not morally wrong to do what they planned. In Justin’s mind, there was a difference between ‘kill’ and ‘murder.’”
Dr. Raffle added one more interesting thing. Before the guilt phase, Justin had declared that if he was acquitted, he wanted to go to Tibet and spend the rest of his life in a monastery.
Dr. Raffle also had the task of reviewing other doctors’ reports on Justin. He told of Dr. Larry Wornian stating that Justin had been a model Mormon boy and had been ordained as a deacon at twelve years of age. He had become a priest at sixteen, and was an elder at nineteen. He left on a mission that year, but he had a hard time with it. When he came home, he felt disillusioned about the LDS Church and himself. He felt “wimpish” and unmasculine. According to Wornian, Justin was in a physical and spiritual crisis.
Dr. Raffle also commented about Dr. Good’s report. He noted Justin saying, “We wanted to avoid violence, but we had to sacrifice the few for the greater good.”
Dr. Carol Walzer’s report was one of the hardest to contend with, for Justin and the defense’s viewpoint. She cited no signs of schizophrenia, bipolar disease or signs of delusion or depression in Justin.
At one point, Jewett brought up the condition to Dr. Raffle that Taylor had been faking his mental illness; so it followed that if he wasn’t insane, Justin could not share in his insanity. In essence, there could not be a folie à deux, since Taylor was not psychotic. Jewett asked Dr. Raffle, “If Justin’s shared delusional disorder is crucial to Taylor’s delusional disorder, and you’ve received all of these reports about Justin knowing of Taylor’s faking—why didn’t you get Justin’s beliefs on that?”
Of these sometimes contentious exchanges, Juley Salkeld said, “The entire exchange between Jewett and Raffle was both frustrating and exhausting, and yet often fascinating. It was as if we were privy to a battle of wits or a chess game with equally matched opponents. Raffle was very deliberate in his answers, as if he was trying to keep his story straight and not give Jewett an inch. Luckily for Jewett, there were plenty of times when Raffle couldn’t support his argument.”
She also said, “I thought the most important part of the day was when Jewett spent probably forty minutes going through each individual case where a witness testified that Taylor was faking his mental illness to get out of work so he could focus on Impact America. On one occasion, he actually hit himself in the head with a rock so he could go to the doctor and claim he fell during a psychotic episode. The whole point was that shared delusional disorder simply didn’t exist if the main psychotic, Taylor, did not have a psychotic disorder.”
Jewett even brought in a statement from Justin, where Justin told someone, “Oh, Taylor’s faking his mental illness so he doesn’t have to work.”
Dr. Raffle countered these contentions, by stating that Taylor had been diagnosed as bipolar since 1998. Taylor also experienced a psychotic disorder on February 25, 1999, and was taken by ambulance to Mount Diablo Hospital. Raffle said that Taylor had delusional disorders more than once, heard voices and was not malingering. He added, “He could not separate the voices from reality. He would spend a few minutes on his knees when the angels were calling.”
Another point of contention between Jewett and Raffle was Justin’s claim that when Annette was cut across the torso, “her organs fell out.” Jewett cited Dr. Reiber as saying this was physically impossible. Jewett asked Raffle if Justin was lying. Dr. Raffle replied to this that Justin had been traumatized at the time, and he might have imagined the organs falling out.
Next on the stand, after a very lengthy stint by Dr. Raffle, was twenty-five-year-old Jennifer Aubrey. She was the daughter of Sherry Matheson, who had directed Harmony in Sacramento. Aubrey was first introduced to Impact in Salt Lake City when she was only eleven years old. She described the experience as very dramatic and very emotional. “Lots of people throwing up, yelling and screaming, degradation and humiliation.” The point was to break down the people’s barriers and take away their belief systems. She said that the new “trainees” were told to trust the trainer, trust the process and trust the environment.
Her training began on a Wednesday at 6:00 A.M. and went until one or two o’clock the following morning. The same thing happened on Thursday and Friday. On Saturday, it went from ten in the morning until nine-thirty that night, when the graduation ceremony began. During the long days, there was very little food or water, and a person could wait hours to use a rest room, to which they were escorted, there and back. Trash cans, in which people could throw up, were strategically placed around the room.
Aubrey’s recollections of Impact were of two large men standing at a double-door entrance and yelling, “Doors open,” and then the people walking into a hall, where bright lights were shining and soft mystical music was playing. The temperature in the room was ice cold; the room was soundproofed; there were no windows. If a person showed any resistance to what the facilitator wanted, a screaming match usually ensued. And if the trainee did not eventually break, they were kicked out of the room.
There were many “games,” as Aubrey called them, including Lifeboat, which had been in at Harmony, Sacramento. Aubrey’s recollection of Lifeboat was pretty much the same as Kelly Lord’s. Aubrey recalled that Justin was a willing participant in everything that happened at Impact. She said, “He was great in training. Very willing. Very engaged. He was really breaking down his walls and finding his inner child. At first, he was very quiet and subdued, but as he progressed, he became more active and involved.”
At one time, Justin even asked Aubrey out on a date. She said she would have gone out with him, but she was engaged at the time.
Aubrey’s impression of Taylor was very different from her take on Justin. She said, “Taylor was domineering, outspoken and opinionated. In one meeting, he took control of the room. He was very charismatic, very powerful. Around women, he was affectionate and flirtatious. He locked eyes with the woman he was speaking with. He was captivating.”
Hoehn asked Aubrey how she felt about Impact now. Tears welled up in her eyes and she related that she had been molested at six years of age. In Impact, she had been taught that even six-year-old victims were responsible for incidents that befell them. Molestation victims were called “daddy’s little sluts” and received no sympathy. Aubrey said it wasn’t until her late teens that she started coming to grips with her molestation. She was currently in therapy about it.
The next witness was David Sullivan. Sullivan had been Cook’s private investigator, and on Cook’s instructions, he took two courses of Impact in March and April 2001. He took the courses in Salt Lake City so that they would be the most similar to the ones Justin had taken. Sullivan said that the new trainees were taught that there was no right and wrong and there were no victims. You were not allowed to use words such as “try, hope and need.” A key concept was the word “choice.” You chose to do something and then had to accept it for good or bad. It was posited there that if you got on a plane that crashed, you were not a victim, but had made a conscious choice to take that flight. They even claimed that the Jews were responsible for their own fates in the Holocaust.
There was a “pity party,” where people in the group laughed and mocked anyone who tried to elicit sympathy for something that had happened to them. Overweight women were forced to put on cow outfits and wear bells around their necks. They were told that their fates were to be hit by a semitruck.
Trainees were encouraged to spread the word about Impact and its positive results. A phrase was used that it would “transform America.” This phrase was not lost on Harold Jewett.
The most incredible incident occurred when Sullivan related his recollections of the game Lifeboat. Sullivan said that the ship you were on sank in shark-infested waters and only four people could climb into a lifeboat and save themselves. All the rest would be dismembered by sharks and killed. Their remains would be picked up later and placed in body bags. All the remains would be intermixed and relatives would have to sort them out later.
Juley Salkeld said, “On cross, Mr. Jewett came unglued. He said, ‘Body bags! Ironic, given the facts of this case!’”
Dr. Larry Wornian had many observations of Justin that varied from those of Dr. Raffle. Dr. Wornian was a neuropsychologist and staff psychologist at San Quentin Prison. He had been in more than fifty trials where a sanity phase was at issue. He was court-appointed for Justin’s case. He answered to Judge Mary Ann O’Malley, and not Jewett or Cook.
Dr. Wornian, when questioned by Jewett, said that he’d gone through over one thousand pages of testimony and police reports about Justin. He’d also studied the finding of the other doctors in the case. Picking up the large notebook before him on the stand, he joked, “I hope this doesn’t give me a hernia.”
In his MCII findings on Justin, he said, “It was one of the most unelevated scales in the whole file. He was an avoidant and shy and retiring person, but not nonfunctional.”
Dr. Wornian met with Justin on December 1, 2003, and noted that Justin was tall and thin and wearing a beard at that point. He didn’t have any tremors, was oriented to place and time, and seemed coherent. Justin discussed his family, Mormonism and his early years. Wornian noted that Justin had trouble adjusting in school and he thought his older brother, Taylor, was everything he was not—popular with girls, smart and outgoing. Justin told him, “I had a lifelong involvement with the LDS Church until I was twenty-six. Then I felt I was lied to by the Church.”
While living with his dad and mom, even in his twenties, he had no girlfriend, little money and few prospects. He said, “I felt imbecilic and simple. I hated that.”
He spoke of four women that he had ever loved. One of them was named Emily. She was good to him, but when she moved away to Brigham Young University in Salt Lake City, he said, “I knew there was no chance with her.”
It was when Carma went to Impact that Justin really began questioning his faith in the Latter-Day Saints Church. After he went to Impact, he said, “I didn’t feel suicidal anymore. It saved my life. I went to the Church and told them I needed an opportunity to sow some wild oats.”
Apparently Justin followed through on this and even asked to be formally excommunicated.
As far as his sexuality went, Justin answered one of Dr. Wornian’s questions by saying, “Did I have homosexual urges? I tried it once. It wasn’t for me.”
Justin added, “Taylor and I became spiritual warriors. We had to make a dent in what Satan was doing. Taylor didn’t really hear voices. They were thoughts. He could immediately see a person’s problems. He was cool to guys, and women loved him.
“We (Justin and Dawn) thought he might be one of the forerunners come to set the Church right. They were wrong about other branches of Christianity. I didn’t agree with them about reincarnation. We’d listen to Taylor and say, ‘Wow, Taylor is channeling,’ and I began to see the truth.
“Over time, I felt that Christ was coming. The Church might protect us, but what about Buddhists? The government was the beast power. You can’t trust the government.”
Dr. Wornian discovered that Justin had been an adherent of the ultraright-wing Bo Gritz. Like some, Justin believed that the Clinton administration was ushering in the reign of Satan. He said, “We thought the government was trying to enslave the American people.”
As far as Taylor scamming Dean Witter, Justin said that the ends justified the means. “You need money to meet with mayors and rich people. We thought that Taylor throwing out ideas was a step closer to success. I had a premortal contract to fulfill. It’s an agreement. A contract before I was even born. I was willing to be a martyr. I was at peace with this knowledge.”
Justin quoted 1 Nephi 4: vs 10–13:
And it came to pass that I was constrained by the Spirit that I should kill Laban; but I said in my heart: Never at any time have I shed the blood of man. And I shrunk and would that I might not slay him.
And the Spirit said unto me again: Behold the Lord hath delivered him into thy hands. Yea, and I also knew that he had sought to take away mine own life; yea, and he would not hearken unto the commandments of the Lord; and he also had taken away our property.
And it came to pass that the Spirit said unto me again: Slay him, for the Lord hath given him into thy hands.
Behold the Lord slayeth the wicked to bring forth his righteous purposes. It is better that one man should perish than a nation should dwindle and perish in unbelief.
Justin said, “Nephi didn’t want to do it. He killed Laban because God told him to. Robin Hood did it too. Robin Hood fought for the oppressed. He was an archetype, someone to aspire to be like.”
Dr. Wornian noted that not only Taylor, but Justin as well, had different plans of how to dispose of bodies. One way that Justin came up with was to pour acid on the remains. Another way was to drop the body parts off a boat at sea. Justin said, “We didn’t just wake up one morning and say, ‘Let’s put them in a duffel bag.’”
As far as the actual killing of Ivan Stineman, Justin said, “I tried to stab him, but the knife kept sticking. There was too much bone. I just wanted to stab him in the heart. Dawn came over and sat on him. I thought this was disgusting. But I never thought this was over the edge. This was for a higher purpose. Like the Twin Towers (on September eleventh). They did it for Allah. They enjoyed killing. I didn’t.
“I did not want to go to heaven in shame. I would not back out of this. No way. No way!”
Wornian said of Justin’s transformation from wimp to spiritual warrior: “It was intoxicating for him. There was a sense of certainty. An enormous amount of power and certitude. He understood full well that the acts they engaged in were grossly immoral. Justin even said, ‘I cried my eyes out’ (about Selina’s death). It was similar to Ivan. I did use a hammer. We just wanted to get it done. I didn’t want her to suffer.’”
As far as chopping up the bodies, Justin said, “It was not a ritual process. It was slimy and it was gross. I had a job to do. A mission to accomplish. I didn’t think it was bad. It was a sacrifice. Somebody had to do it.”
Dr. Paul Good’s assessment of Justin was different from the other two doctors. Dr. Good had done forensic work about people involved in crimes since 1990. He was often a court-appointed psychiatrist. Good saw Justin on three occasions. He also spoke once with Dawn Godman.
Dr. Good administered a Rorschach inkblot test to Justin, and he also read two books on cults and one on Mormonism. Good said, “I’ve read the complete transcript on Dawn Godman. I’ve read the transcripts on Keri Furman and Justin’s journals from 1998.
“This case is the most disturbing one of my career. It was difficult to read about what happened. The motivations were difficult and complex. I found Justin to be cooperative and genuine in the interviews. And he was not malingering.
“He did believe that Taylor was a prophet who was channeling God. Transform America would be a humanitarian service.”
Cook asked Good, “Were they (Dawn and Justin) telling you this was an act of love?”
Good answered, “Yes.”
Good also said, “I felt that Justin had feelings and conflicts with what he did at the time of the crime. It was very complex. Justin told me, ‘I was convinced they were suffering. I didn’t want them to suffer.’”
“I was struck by the amount of feeling that Justin felt. He didn’t want to use violence at first. He was upset with Taylor when he revived Ivan and Annette. He even admitted, ‘I thought Taylor had a moment of insanity. ’”
Justin told Dr. Good that the killings were necessary as a sacrifice. He said, “The words ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ never came up.”
Good explained, “When I look at the totality of my conclusion, it was more than Justin could tell me. I believe at some level he knew this was wrong.”
Cook asked him, “Why would he do it, then?”
Good answered, “Because of religious training. That there were certain characters, certain prophets, who had to kill for God.”
Justin had spoken of the sacrifices of Abraham in the Bible and Nephi in the Book of Mormon. Good said, “Justin and Taylor and Dawn were a cultlike group. They were separated from outside influences. Justin became less independent in the group. His family dynamics contributed to that. He was a guy who lost his way.
“I don’t think it took him so far that it made him psychotic. He essentially made a big mistake. It was his own mother’s suggestion that he attend Harmony. Often a course [like Harmony] can be destructive. It took away his foundations.
“Throughout history, killing for God had been the rule rather than the exception.” Good referred to radical Islam in our own time. He said that faith by itself was not delusional. Christians believed in the virgin birth and resurrection of Jesus, while other faiths did not. What seemed like divine intervention by one seemed like a crazy myth to another.
Good said, “Justin was an odd fellow. Believing Taylor was a prophet of God helped him cope. It gave Justin a foundation. It’s always a difficult diagnosis when religion is involved. I have to look for other signs of psychosis.”
Dr. Good noted that Justin was coherent during the crimes and afterward as well. Justin wrote intelligible letters from jail after he was arrested. As far as a shared delusional disorder went, Good said he had asked to interview Taylor and was refused by Taylor’s lawyer.
Another key to Justin’s sanity was his own account of how he and Dawn had decided that Taylor was a prophet of God. They thought at first it was the drugs that Taylor was using, and they made him say the things he said. “But then I thought that he might be influenced by an evil spirit,” Justin explained. It was by the process of elimination that they came to the conclusion that Taylor was a prophet. Good said, “That process was a rational process.”
Then Good told Cook, “Justin retained enough sanity to know right from wrong. The lesson I learned from this case was a decent person can do horrible things.”
On cross, Jewett zeroed in on the issue of Justin knowing right from wrong. Dr. Good told him, “Justin said, ‘I was totally conscious that people would judge us and condemn us. They wouldn’t understand it was a humanitarian act.’ Then he added, ‘Just because Taylor was indeed a prophet, I wouldn’t follow everything he said.’”
Good explained, “Justin was in a weakened state, but I believe he was rational enough to say no.”
Dr. Good spoke of a jailhouse letter from Justin to Taylor on August 29, 2000, in which Justin said that he thought he would already be released because authorities would think others had done the crimes. He also gave Taylor advice about how to lie to jailers.
Juley Salkeld was fascinated by the dynamics of the victims’ family members and Carma Helzer throughout the testimony of the various doctors. Juley recalled, “Carma arrived late one day and her usual seat was taken by Olga Land, [Jennifer’s sister], and their two daughters. While this testimony was going on, the teenage daughters passed notes to each other and played hangman with words like ‘psycho.’
“During this entire proceeding, Carma kept her head down and took copious notes. Taylor was the first to be excommunicated from the Church, and it came up in trial that Carma was next, followed by Justin. In talking about Carma’s excommunication—Justin had spoken to the doctor about his mother’s attitude for doing so, for experimentation purposes. Justin wanted to experiment too. Carma wanted to know if God would still love her if she left the Church and experimented. Justin wanted to try the sinning department. He wanted to see if he became a demonic-possessed person if God would still love him. He felt that he would be forgiven and the Church would take him back, which gave him the ‘okay’ to sin. His sinning things were things like drinking, drugs, sex, coffee and cigarettes.”
Out of the jury’s presence, Cook wanted to call Dr. Douglas Tucker to the stand so he could expound on Justin’s religious beliefs and drug usage, especially in the summer of 2000. Jewett said that nothing Dr. Tucker might add would be new. He said that Cook had already missed his chance to call him during directs. Jewett said, “This is a serious dose of gamesmanship. He (Cook) chose not to call Dr. Walzer. If he intends to call Dr. Tucker, he needed to inform me. If there’s nothing different (than what had already been covered), they can’t call him.”
Cook: Mr. Jewett has a lot of suspicions.
Jewett: A lot of suspicions.
Cook: The remark about “games playing” is nonsense. My client is fighting for his life. It would be a grave injustice to deny this witness.
Jewett: I implore the court to look at Dr. Worninan’s report. Everything he said was in the report.
Cook specifically wanted to get in the case of a man who suffered from religious delusions. The man had somehow decided that God told him to chop down trees in a city park. Even though he felt it was wrong to do so, the man felt that he had no other choice.
Jewett contended that the case was a stretch and very hypothetical at best. Jewett said, “How does this hypothetical [anecdote] help? There is no meaningful basis. I mean, vandalism versus killing people?”
Cook: I’m entitled to bring in about this disorder. It brings clarity to the jury.
O’Malley: Where are you going with this?
Cook: I don’t know yet.
O’Malley: You know where you’re going, Mr. Cook. Please be honest.
Cook: I’m not going to respond to that. I’m trying to tie this to a religious delusion.
Judge O’Malley was beginning to get irritated, and said, “My reading of it (the pertinent case) is that a theory is allowed within the limits of evidence. It does not allow to ask about a different case study.” She denied Cook’s motion.
Cook was irritated as well, and Chris Darden noticed that it was the only time that he saw the otherwise polite and conscientious Cook not rise when the jurors filed in.
Dr. Douglas Tucker was allowed on the stand with a limited scope. He could not speak about any religious topics. Judge O’Malley deemed that those had already been fully covered. He could, however, talk about drug use and its effects on Justin. In fact, Judge O’Malley cited People v. Carter and said that religious beliefs were not rebuttal. She told Cook, “I don’t want to hear one thing about religion.”
Tucker did talk about meth use and the effects it might have had on Justin in 2000. But his discourse was not a “knockout blow” that the defense needed at this stage.
The sanity phase was key for the defense. In some ways, they had acceded fairly early on that Justin would probably be found guilty of the crimes. Now they wanted to prove that he was too insane when the crimes occurred for him to have made a rational judgment in what he was doing.
Hoehn spoke of how lucky Keri Furman had been. He said, “She got away from Taylor in time. Justin and Dawn didn’t.”
Hoehn brought up about the wooden staffs with the carved skull and crystal. These items had been sitting at the front of the court near the evidence boxes for weeks on end, in full view of the jury. Hoehn said of these, “Don’t let the prosecution fool you with straw men and false items. This person (Justin) deserves justice by the standards of the law. It was not a choice by him to be mentally ill. So what followed from it was not a choice.
“He (Justin) was a true believer and he was deluded. He wanted the love of his brother. A person can lose their moral compass when under the spell of a charismatic, crazy person.”
Hoehn spoke of the history of mental illness in the extended Helzer family. He said that Dr. Raffle saw Justin for thirteen hours, while Dr. Wornian and Dr. Walzer only saw Justin for two hours apiece.
Hoehn said, “Use your common sense. What would cause a person who is gentle and loving to do these acts? Don’t let Mr. Jewett distance you from your common sense. Do you want to look for the cause, or just seek revenge? This is an American tragedy. Sanity and insanity are the issues.
“You had two wonderful doctors who said he was insane at the time of the crimes. He didn’t like what he was doing. He felt that he had to. He was no sadist. He felt he had to do it for his premortal contract. This was a cult, and Taylor was its leader. Justin was one of Taylor’s victims.”
Hoehn pointed directly at Justin and forcefully said, “This is a diseased person!”
Harold Jewett was just as forceful in his presentation. “I’ll talk about something Mr. Hoehn didn’t talk about—the law. You looked at those photos. Those killings and dismemberments were done in the name of God, peace and love? Personality and adjustment disorders are not enough for an insanity plea. He knew the nature and quality of his acts!
“We saw a lot in Justin’s journal about the idea of choice. The journal shows a logical thought process. They were nothing he got from Taylor.
“Mr. Hoehn brought up what a nice guy Justin was. Remember what he told Sarah Brents? He said, ‘I’ve only been friends with you to see if I could fuck you!’
“Those are the actions of a rude, arrogant and asocial man.”
Jewett also brought up about the disturbing and bloody poem that Justin had let Johnette Gray read.
“There was a logic and reason in these crimes,” Jewett said. “In respect to the organs [of Annette Stineman], there was something very pagan going on there. There is an undercurrent of a pagan ritual. And those pagan ideas were Justin’s. In his own words, Justin said, ‘If I become demonic, will God still love me?’”
As to folie à deux, Jewett said sarcastically, “If Joseph Smith was delusional, do we have folie á eleven million?”
Jewett told the jury that Justin was never diagnosed with mental illness before the crimes. He said there were no psych reports in 2000 or 2001. The first evaluation of Justin didn’t occur until May 2002, and by then, Jewett contended, Justin was beginning to think about an insanity plea.
Jewett spoke of the doctors who were not called by the defense because their reports would say that Justin was sane. These doctors included a man named O’Reilly and Carol Walzer. Walzer’s report, in particular, showed that on the MMPI test, Justin showed no signs of mental illness. He was depressed and socially ill at ease, but not mentally ill.
Dr. Raffle didn’t even interview Justin until May 2003, Jewett said, and when he did, Justin told him, “The ends justify the means.” Asked if he would kill someone, Justin answered, “If the reason was good enough, yes.”
It showed that reason was a part of Justin’s mental capacity, according to Jewett. Justin was even cogent enough to tell Dr. Raffle on a question, “I don’t want to answer that question. It may lead back to the case.”
Jewett brought up the fact that Justin told someone in the mid-1990s: “Even if I sinned, and repented, I would be forgiven.” It showed that he made a conscious choice to sin.
Things really propelled Justin to plead insanity, according to Jewett, when Dawn Godman agreed to testify in exchange for a plea bargain. In October 2003, Justin’s lawyers entered a plea for him, not guilty by reason of insanity.
Jewett cited Dr. Wornian saying, “Justin Helzer was sane. He had a personality disorder, but not enough to stop him from understanding the nature of his acts. He did understand what was legally right and wrong.
“When you balance all the evidence—there is no mental disease as noted in DSM4. Justin even said, ‘I will follow Taylor nine out often times.’ It shows that he was capable of making a choice.”
Unlike the guilt phase, the defense had a last chance to speak in the sanity phase. Hoehn told the jurors, “At the time of the crimes, Justin Helzer was insane. So said Dr. Raffle. So said Dr. Dolgoff. Follow the law according to the doctors, not the words of Mr. Jewett. He (Justin) was crazy! He was out of touch with reality!”
Judge O’Malley then gave the jurors instructions for the sanity phase. They were not to be swayed in reaching their verdict either by sentiment or pity. The only issue before them was sanity or insanity. They were not to think about sentencing. They could consider if Justin knew moral right from wrong. The burden of proof was now on the defense, but unlike the guilty phase, they did not need to go beyond a reasonable doubt. If they were 51 percent sure that Justin was insane at the time of the crime, then they had to vote for insanity.
Chris Darden was in Judge O’Malley’s courtroom as Jewett and Cook were discussing some topics with the judge. Around 3:45 P.M. on July 15, Chris noted that a buzzer went off and bailiff Mike Harkelroad announced, “We have a verdict.”
“What?” Daniel Cook asked in surprise.
Even Harold Jewett seemed to be surprised by the announcement.
An hour was given for family members and reporters to come to the courtroom. Chris noted that Heather rushed into the court about 4:30 P.M., just as the jurors were filing in. A few minutes later, the verdict in the sanity phase of Justin Alan Helzer was read by court clerk Tom Moyer. The verdict was that Justin had been sane at the time of the crime. He could now face the death penalty.
Chris said, “About three seconds after Tom sat down, Carma rushed in all out of breath. She didn’t know what just happened. Heather put her arm around her mother and whispered in her ear. Carma nodded her head and didn’t say a thing.”
Much of the defense team’s hopes had lain with the sanity phase. With those hopes dashed, the sentencing phase truly was a matter of life and death for Justin Helzer. Cook wanted to exclude witnesses who would testify during the victim impact statements from sitting in the gallery during other witnesses’ testimony. He told Judge O’Malley, “Their natural humanity may project itself into the trial when it shouldn’t.”
Judge O’Malley responded, “I’m going to start with an admonition. I will deal with this, incident by incident. There are emotions on both sides. I can understand emotions.”
Then she spoke directly to family members. “I cannot begin to put myself into your situation. As hard as this is, I’m going to ask you to curb your emotions. If you are going to wipe your eyes, lower your head to do it. Everything you have done so far has been outstanding. I would hate the next step to be the removal of witnesses.”
On July 21, 2004, Cook was looking at photos of victims and still asking for the exclusion of victim impact statements as being too prejudicial and inflammatory. He was quiet and determined in his arguments. He cited a U.S. Supreme Court case involving an O’Connor decision concerning the Eighth Amendment. He also said that victim impact statements in California were up to interpretation.
Jewett countered with California court and United States court decisions contrary to Cook’s allegations. He said, “Emotional testimony is the tenet of this phase. I want to have the jury up personal and real about feelings of the victims’ families. Why a person loved another is relevant.”
Judge O’Malley took these things into consideration and cited Tennessee v. Price and California v. Mitchum. She said these cases allowed such victim impact statements to be heard by a jury. She also noted that the potential victim impact witness list included seventeen people. She said for the number of victims, this was not excessive.
After all the motions, the jury was brought in at 10:00 A.M. Almost immediately, victims’ family members grabbed boxes of tissues and passed them around. Because of all the people in the courtroom, Carma Helzer had to sit directly next to Jim Gamble’s mother.
As the family members settled in, an incredible thing happened. Justin, who had been quiet and cooperative during the whole trial, began to speak. At first, his voice was so low that people outside of the first two rows could not hear him. But then his words became louder and more persistent. He said, “I want this life to be over. I want to die. I just want to die!”
Momentarily stunned, Judge O’Malley raised her own voice and said, ‘No. No. No. This is not the time for this.”
Justin continued, calm but determined. “I’m not trying to be rude or anything. I just want to die.”
Judge O’Malley’s voice became louder and she shook her finger at Justin. “No. No. I’m not going to have this, Mr. Helzer!”
Carma Helzer in the second row began crying quietly. Then as emotion took over, her whole body became racked with sobs. Before long, she was wailing in the courtroom.
Justin would not cease, even as his lawyers tried to calm him down. “I just want to die!” became his mantra. It was a surreal scene; Justin begging for death, Judge O’Malley ordering him to be quiet, and Carma Helzer sobbing.
Judge O’Malley, seeing that she was getting nowhere with Justin, had the courtroom cleared of jury and gallery. One of the last sentences anyone heard as they filed out was “I don’t know what possessed you, Mr. Helzer!”
Out in the hallway, it was an incredible scene—jurors bunched together down at one end of the hallway, journalists and gallery milling around in the central alcove, and Carma Helzer, off to the side, crying near the stairs. This situation lasted for nearly fifteen minutes, until everyone was ushered back into the courtroom. As a chastened Justin Helzer sat quietly, Judge O’Malley instructed the jury, “Anything you may have heard, you must disregard and base your decision on evidence.” Then the long parade of friends and family of the victims began.
Judy Nemec was first. She spoke of her parents’ life and her life with them. Then she described the dark days of August 2000. “I clearly was in a panic,” she said. “It was like losing a child at the mall. We were in such shock. Finally I knew we wouldn’t find them alive.”
Jewett noted that she had been in court almost every day of Justin’s trial. He asked her why:
Judy: We’d read the papers for weeks of all the horrible things. We understood that all the evidence had to be presented. [We waited] for some kind of closure.
Jewett: Briefly tell about your time in court.
Judy: All of this is horrible. They were not ready to die—the victims of a harebrained scheme. What pisses me the most, I never got to tell them goodbye. Before trial, I cried every day. I’m fearful of being in public alone. I don’t open my doors to strangers. Before, it was my imagination running wild. Now it is more focused.
Nancy Hall also gave a recitation of her parents’ lives. Jewett asked her the same question of why she had come to court every day. She answered, “I have to get some kind of closure, though I don’t think this will ever be closed. The hardest thing for me is to know that once they’d been taken, what their thoughts must have been for each other. Their last moments.”
And so it went, friends and family speaking for Jim Gamble, for Jenny Villarin and for Selina Bishop. Olga Land said of Selina after they knew Jenny was dead, “We knew that Selina would want to curl up in her mommy’s bed. But she never came home. I started to realize she would never come home. Selina wouldn’t have hurt anybody. I’ve been here almost every day for four months. Jenny and Selina would have been here for me.”
Robert Asuncion added, “I don’t take anything for granted anymore.” Then he looked right at the jury and said, “Hold your children. Tell them that you love them.”
David Villarin was angry and his testimony was potent. He had always been the rock in the family. He said, “I was horrified that somebody could do this. They treated ’em like trash! They dumped their bodies like garbage in the river!”
After the last of the victims’ witnesses, it was Cook’s turn to present witnesses as to Justin’s life and character. Jason Chavez had known Justin at the LDS Third Ward. He attended missionary-school classes with Justin there in 1993. Justin had taught some of the classes. Chavez said, “Justin didn’t have a lot of stage presence. But he taught by the Spirit. He was a guy who followed the Spirit. He was the most loving guy I knew. You wanted to be around a guy like Justin. He was a person who lived as he taught.
“Justin was a pure-hearted man who lived the principles of the Gospel. I realize how unpopular this is (speaking up for Justin). That the victims’ families are here. But I have to do this. This is the least I could do for the wonderful friend that he was.”
Chris Bergez had become acquainted with Justin at the Kaiser Hospital in Concord when Justin worked there. Justin followed Bergez on his rounds, and Bergez taught him how to take care of patients. Justin was always patient and kind and particularly so with the elderly. Bergez said, “We helped people get back on their feet again. Justin was enthusiastic about life. He was a great kid on a way to a good career. He stuck out because he was a kind, intelligent person. I never could have imagined he would do something like this. He does have some redeeming factors.”
George Pinney, Justin’s old teacher at Sunday school, said, “I saw the Helzer family once a month at home study. This was when Justin was in junior high school. Justin used to baby-sit our kids. I wouldn’t have handed over that responsibility to just anyone. He did an excellent job.
“Even at a young age, he was very committed to the Gospel. He would often be ridiculed by other kids for being too ‘churchy.’ Focusing on God wasn’t a top priority for a lot of thirteen- and fourteen-year-olds. Even when he got flak for it, he wasn’t ashamed of things he believed in. He wasn’t confrontational, but he wouldn’t back down.
“Justin had a huge admiration of Taylor. A very strong love and sense of devotion. He kind of worshiped at Taylor’s feet. They were very different guys. Taylor was dynamic, even domineering. His eyes were piercing. Justin was quiet, soft-spoken and reserved. He was a follower.
“I remember when I first saw what he was accused of in the news. The Justin I knew would have said stop. It wasn’t the Justin I knew. One thing I do know, Justin would have followed Taylor off the face of the earth.”
Justin’s cousin Charney Hoffman picked up on this theme. He said, “It was impossible to be around Taylor without being deeply influenced by him. The experience of being in Taylor’s presence was so profound, I think it would be difficult for someone with Justin’s personality. I don’t think Justin had a chance.”
One of the most powerful spokesmen for Justin was fifty-four-year-old George Chiu. Chiu was a pharmacist, and in the year 2000 he was convicted of embezelling from the company he worked for. He had to spend sixteen months of his time in the Contra Costa County Jail. It was there that he met Justin at the Bible-study class. Chiu said, “I got to know Justin on a personal level. He was a gentle spirit. He never talked about his crimes. Everyone was afraid of him originally. Everyone shied away from him.
“Justin had a good knowledge of scripture. We were there to learn. It wasn’t just an excuse to get out of the pod. It was for inner peace. We looked forward to it every week. We also felt like brothers in the group. To forgive and move on.”
Justin even taught Chiu some yoga. Chiu said, “I got a benefit from Justin. Yoga removed me from a tough environment. I read cards that his mom would write. And they were the most beautiful cards. I could imagine what his mom was going through.
“I stuck out like a sore thumb in jail. It was a huge range of inmates. Everything from drunk driving to murder. But they were all real human beings. Justin and I wouldn’t have been friends on the street, but in there I perceived him as a gentle spirit. A gentle soul. He carried himself well with other people. Always a hard worker. Not just to pass the time, but to make the best of the situation.
“Justin was not prejudiced. He didn’t have animosity for any group or anyone.”
As far as why Chiu thought Justin should live rather than receive the death sentence, he said, “I feel strongly he will help others to come to God. I’m starting a new life. I’m blessed. You learn from your mistakes.” In fact, Chiu had flown all the way from the Philippines to speak up for Justin at his trial. He was on a business trip and took a break from it to attend the trial as a witness.
Just as powerful as Chiu, in her own way, was Ann, Taylor Helzer’s ex-wife. She said, “It’s mind-boggling about Justin’s part in this. Justin truly has a heart of gold. He never would have done any of this without Taylor’s interaction. Justin was the most sweet, loving and caring guy I knew. We’re all terribly sorry. This never should have happened. I can’t begin to put myself in the victims’ families’ shoes.”
Then she turned to the jury and implored, “Please spare Justin’s life. Please! Justin is a worthwhile person, even if you cannot see that now. People can learn positive things from Justin.”
After Ann, Jewett wanted to bring various incident reports into the trial. Outside the presence of the jury, he said there were three in particular. In one instance, Justin had been waiting in line at a Bank of America in Concord when an elderly man cut in front of everyone. When Justin told him that he’d cut into line, the man became belligerent. He even shoved Justin. Justin continued to argue and pushed the man so hard that he fell down. The police were called to the scene.
There were also jailhouse incidents. Justin was in a food line in jail when an argument broke out about who was first in line. Justin began to reach for a sandwich from the sandwich bin when a deputy told him, “Go to the other line.”
Instead of following orders, Justin told the deputy, “Chill out.”
The deputy asked, “What?”
Justin replied, “You heard me.”
In another incident, a deputy was walking by the cells when he saw Justin and his cellmate punching each other. The deputy told them to stop and they complied. In his report, the deputy did say that he didn’t know if they were just playing around or if Justin was defending himself.
A third jailhouse incident occurred when Justin got a new cellmate. The new cellmate complained about Justin’s eating habits. He said that Justin had more than forty oranges stuffed into a desk drawer. He also said that he hadn’t been in the cell for more than forty-five minutes when Justin started talking about God and the Devil. According to the cellmate, Justin told him, “I believe in the Devil more than in Jesus Christ.”
Within two hours of being placed in the cell, the new person wanted to be transferred away from Justin. He said that Justin sat down on the toilet to urinate. The new person concocted a story and told the guards that Justin wanted to kill him. Later, he recanted on the story, but he still did not want to be returned to Justin’s cell.
Judge O’Malley ruled that Jewett could tell the jurors about the bank incident, but not about any of the jailhouse incidents. Cook made a request that he be allowed to put Carma Helzer on the stand and ask her only two questions. He wanted to restrict Jewett to only ask her about these two questions as well. But Judge O’Malley would not limit Jewett to those guidelines. According to Chris Darden, “Carma was sitting with her eyes closed and her hands clasped together as if praying for the request to be granted.”
Carma’s prayers went unanswered. Judge O’Malley denied the request and Carma Helzer did not take the stand in Justin’s trial.
Closing arguments in the sentencing phase reverted to the original format, where Jewett spoke first, followed by Cook, and then a short rebuttal by Jewett. Jewett brought in all the aggravating circumstances, from Justin buying a Beretta 9mm pistol, to his use of one in the military, and when he nodded his head at Taylor at the Stinemans’ door, indicating “come on.” It was a very long list that included killing Ivan Stineman by bashing his head on a bathroom floor and killing Selina with a hammer blow to the head.
Jewettt told the jurors, “Remember the victims’ impact statements. Judy having to go down to the Concord Police Department to submit DNA for comparison. Judy receiving the phone call from the Concord police that a torso and right arm had been found in a duffel bag.
“Remember Frances Nelson [Jim Gamble’s mother] saying, ‘I never got to say good-bye to my son, Hal. I never said good-bye.’
“Remember Olga Land saying how close Selina and Jenny were. Jenny never would have hurt anyone unless they hurt Selina.”
Daniel Cook was more emotional now than he had ever been during all the other phases of the trial. He told the jurors, “I gotta say, when you happen to look in your rearview mirror and see Mr. Jewett barreling down on you . . . if you don’t think that’s trouble, boy, you don’t know what trouble is. Last week all of you made the decision that this man is going to die in prison for sure. You’ve already decided that. Now it’s your decision of when.”
Cook told them there were eleven circumstances in which the death penalty could be imposed in California. He said it was for the worst of the worst, and Justin did not fall into that category.
Almost crying and angry at Jewett, Cook told the jurors that Justin’s military record had to go on the side of mitigating circumstances, not aggravating ones. He said, “This just gets under my skin that the prosecutor would use my client’s military and veteran’s status as an aggravating factor. My client served his country with honor and dignity!
“This is not a game between the prosecutor and defense attorney. This is not a competition to see who wins. Seek and maintain the moral high ground. You are not grouped together as one. Each of the twelve of you are separate impartial judges. Stand for life. Choose life! Choosing life without parole doesn’t mean you’re not sensitive to the crimes that happened. Rise up! Choose life!”
Jewett’s response during the rebuttal was swift and sarcastic. “Choose life! Justin didn’t afford that choice to the five victims! Ivan’s murder alone is punishable by the death penalty.”
Then Jewett played a short audiotape retrieved from a new phone machine the Stinemans had bought. They were having trouble with the machine and Ivan’s voice could be heard saying, “Just buy a new one.”
Annette responded, “I’d hate to do that because what’ll we do with this one? It’ll just end up out in the garage like everything else.”
At that moment, one of the Stinemans’ cats wandered in, and everyone in court heard Annette say, “Goochy-goochy-goo” to the cat.
The courtroom erupted into laughter, including the jurors and Judge O’Malley. But it was laughter tinged with sadness. They all knew that those voices would be stilled on August 2, 2000.
The court regulars were stumped about how this verdict would turn out. Usually in unanimity on the outcomes, they were divided now. Chris Darden said, “I’m completely lost on what the verdict will be. Something I never was on the other phases. Juror number five—she was already struggling with the verdict on the other phases. I think she doesn’t want to put Justin to death, but she also loves the Stinemans.”
The jurors decided not to congregate on Friday, July 30, 2004, in the deliberation room. They gathered again on Monday, August 2, 2004, at 9:37 A.M. and deliberated all through the day.
One of the courtroom regulars, Chris, was sitting on a bench out in the hallway in front of Judge O’Malley’s courtroom when he saw the jurors coming. He said, “As the jurors were walking to the stairwell, Mike the bailiff turned around, looked at me and said, ‘Don’t leave.’
“Mike came out of O’Malley’s courtroom, walked over to me and said, ‘There’s been a verdict! It’s going to be read tomorrow morning at nine A.M.’ I was completely shocked and caught off guard.”
Then Chris, note taker that he always was, jotted down what he thought the verdict would be. He wrote, “Three death penalties—Ivan Stineman, Annette Stineman and Selina Bishop.” He did admit later that this was just a guess and he really didn’t know how things would turn out.
Chris also jotted down, “Tomorrow when the verdict is read, it will be four years to the day when Jennifer and James were killed.”
On the morning of Tuesday, August 3, 2004, the courtroom was packed as the jurors filed in. As soon as they sat down, they all held each other’s hands throughout the reading of the verdict. Tom Moyer, the court clerk, read the jurors’ decision. He began, “We the jury recommend Justin Alan Helzer be put to death. . . .”
As soon as Tom said “death,” according to Chris, juror number five began sobbing uncontrollably. She doubled over in her seat, still holding hands with jurors four and six. Other jurors were crying softly as well. Justin Helzer sat passively and seemed to stare at nothing in particular. Chris Darden’s prediction from the day before came true—Justin received the death penalty for the murders of Ivan, Annette and Selina. He got life without the possibility of parole for Jennifer and James.
Daniel Cook had the jurors polled individually on all the death penalty counts. Tom Moyer made his way from juror to juror, asking them if death was their true verdict. Each of them answered yes until juror number five. She was crying uncontrollably by now and could not speak. Tom stood patiently, waiting for her to calm down.
According to Chris, “Judge O’Malley looked at juror number five with compassionate eyes, patiently awaiting her answer as well. Finally after about thirty seconds or more of silence and waiting, juror number five, while sobbing, mustered up the word yes, which was barely audible.
“Instead of the usual five bailiffs on a verdict announcement, they had eight bailiffs in the courtroom. Judge O’Malley started crying while she was thanking the jury. She told them, ‘We have placed a heavy burden on all of you. This county will be indebted to you all.’
“Then, while the jury was excused, five bailiffs went over to the jury box step and formed a tight wall so the jury could exit through the side door. The press and media cameras could not come inside O’Malley’s courtroom. So every time someone would open up the double doors to exit, there were three photographers snapping pictures of every single person coming out, connected to the case or not.
“All the television cameras were at the exit door and bombarded the Stineman daughters and all the Bishop, Villarin and Gamble families with their bright lights and microphones in their faces.
“The press and media were all outside the courtroom in the lobby of the second floor. I had my back against the courtroom double doors, and Carma and Heather happened to walk up to their usual spots next to the courtroom doors. The press and media started snapping still pictures of us from about five different cameras. There were cameras being held up high in the air, outstretched by the photographers’ arms, and then other photographers going underneath my armpit to snap pictures of Carma and Heather. All this time, I held up papers to cover the side of my face.
“I had Heather hide on the opposite side of me and I used my body as a shield, since she was facing the cameras head-on. And I had Carma stand directly in front of me and face me, so her back was to the cameras. It was bad! A very uncomfortable situation.”
After the chaos of the courtroom hallway, the victims’ family members went to different locales to hold impromptu memorial services.
A reporter for the Contra Costa Times was in Marin County and spoke with an employee at the Paper Mill Creek Saloon. The employee said, “I just wish he’d (Justin) say he was ready for execution now. But he won’t because he’s a selfish pig. He’s not a man.”
Down the road at a memorial in Forest Knolls, friends, relatives and family members of Selina Bishop, Jennifer Villarin and James Gamble held hands in a circle. Robert Asuncion said, “We thank God for our family and for keeping us together. If it wasn’t for the strength of this family, it would be tough right now. If it wasn’t for the strength of our friends, it would be tough right now.”
David Villarin added, “For the loss we’ve had, we are rich in memories and rich in the love we have for each other. It’s a relief today. It’s not a celebration. It will never be a celebration.”
Jenny’s sister Olga Land summed it up for many by saying, “It’s not a baseball game. We didn’t win. Nobody won.”
The trial for Justin Alan Helzer was over. The trial for Glenn Taylor Helzer was just beginning.