Bellevue family's killer gets life in prison
Repost
Seattle
Post-Intelligencer newspaper:
Bellevue family's killer gets life in prison
Saturday, January 8, 2000
By ELAINE PORTERFIELD
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER
The final resolution to a Bellevue murder spree came yesterday as a
judge
sentenced David Anderson to life in prison without parole for slaying a
family
of four.
Before a packed courtroom, King County Superior Court Judge Jeffery
Ramsdell
briefly stared down from the bench at Anderson, 20, before speaking.
"A jury unilaterally convicted you for four . . . brutal and senseless
murders," Ramsdell said. "I will resist the temptation to unnecessarily
belabor
this and say anything more."
With that, Ramsdell handed down the sentence.
Relatives of the victims -- Bill, Rose, Kimberly and Julia Wilson --
attended
the sentencing, but declined to make any remarks to the judge. Anderson,
a slim
figure, also remained silent, although he, too, had the right to address
the
court.
Anderson was convicted Dec. 17 after two trials. The first time, a jury
split
11-1 in favor of conviction. In November 1998, his friend and partner in
the
slayings, Alex Baranyi, was also convicted of four counts of aggravated
murder.
Baranyi, who confessed, is also serving a life sentence without
possibility of
release. He gave little motive for the killings, except to say he was in
a rut
and that he and his friend wanted to experience something "truly
phenomenal."
Prosecutors say Anderson had talked for years about committing a murder
before
the Wilsons were slain, and on numerous occasions specifically discussed
killing that particular family and stealing their property.
Both men were 17 at the time of the slayings in January 1997, too young
for
prosecutors to seek the death penalty.
Prosecutors say Anderson and Baranyi strangled Kim Wilson, 20, at a
Woodridge-neighborhood park in south Bellevue and dumped her body in
bushes.
They then crept into her family's nearby home with knives and a baseball
bat,
police say, where they beat and stabbed her parents, Bill and Rose, and
her
17-year-old sister, Julia.
The weapons were never found.
Deputy Prosecutor Jeff Baird has called the slayings "somewhere between
murder
and genocide."
His co-counsel, Patricia Eakes, was reflective after the sentencing.
Memories
of the case will never leave her, she said, because she was with police
when
the bodies of Bill, Rose and Julia were discovered.
Eakes and the officers had gone to the home to inform them that
Kimberly's body
had been found.
"I've never discovered bodies before," she said. "It's just difficult to
describe how I feel about everything. It was such a shock. We thought we
were
going to the home to notify them of the death of their daughter. It was
like a
bad dream."
Anderson's second trial lasted three months. Eakes said earlier she
believes
they did a better job presenting evidence to the jury.
The defense maintained that Anderson had nothing to do with the murders,
arguing that boots stained with the blood of Julia and Bill Wilson may
have
been planted in his bedroom by the real killer.
Pete Connick, one of Anderson's attorneys, said he has already filed an
appeal
in the case, based on numerous unsuccessful defense motions seeking a
new
trial.
"We believe there are some pretty serious issues," Connick said, giving
no
details.
Anderson's parents, Leslie and Bruce Anderson, attended the sentencing,
but
left the courtroom grim and silent. They were present nearly every time
their
son was in court.
Both are convinced he was wrongly convicted, Connick said.
"No question about it, he's innocent," he said.
----------------------------------------
The following four news articles all appear courtesy of the 1/8/00
online
edition of The Bellevue Eastside Journal newspaper:
Life terms for Anderson: Bellevue killer gets maximum sentence; defense
to
appeal
Saturday, January 08, 2000
By Noel S. Brady
Journal Reporter
BELLEVUE -- For three years, residents of Bellevue's Woodridge
neighborhood
watched with horror as the story of an entire family's murder unfolded
before
them.
Yesterday that story came to a close with the sentencing of the second
of two
murderers who methodically planned and carried out the massacre of Bill
and
Rose Wilson and their two daughters, Kimberly and Julia.
David Carpenter Anderson, 20, will spend the rest of his life in a steel
cage.
King County Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Ramsdell, calling the killings
``savage murders,'' gave Anderson four life sentences with no
possibility of
early parole. The mandatory sentence was the same as that handed to
Anderson's
accomplice, Alex Baranyi, 20, in 1999.
The sentencing also concluded a tangled investigation by detectives and
prosecutors. For Senior Deputy Prosecutor Patricia Eakes, the experience
began
Jan. 5, 1997, when she and Bellevue detective Jeff Gomes drove to
Woodridge to
inform the Wilsons of their daughter Kim's murder.
When the family didn't answer, Eakes and Gomes became suspicious and
entered
the house through a sliding glass door, which they later learned was
usually
unlocked.
Both have said what they found inside would forever change their
understanding
of the evil that human beings are capable of unleashing.
`` It's fair to say this sentence doesn't even come close to what we
like to
imagine justice is,'' Eakes said during yesterday morning's sentencing.
`` These murders weren't motivated by the actions and thoughts of Alex
Baranyi,'' she said. ``It was calculated for two years by David Anderson
to
exterminate the Wilson family.''
Bruce and Leslie Anderson quelled their tears and coddled Anderson's
baby
brother as the judge sealed their son's fate. Yesterday, as they did
throughout
the trial, the Andersons sat directly behind the Wilsons' relatives.
Most of the jurors watched from a row of benches behind Anderson's
family.
Neither the Andersons nor the Wilsons would comment.
Even so, it was clear from their silence and the furrows on their faces
that
the anguish of losing four loved ones and the horror of watching a son
condemned to die in prison have taken a heavy toll.
`` Obviously this is very difficult for the Andersons,'' defense
attorney Peter
Connick said. ``Despite the court's decision, they believe their son is
innocent. We believed (Anderson), and we still do.''
Connick said he has already begun an appeal process for his client, and
he
asked the judge to grant the motion as soon as possible.
For the supporters of the Wilson family who observed every day of
Anderson's
three-month second trial, the sentencing marked a long-awaited closure
to a
three-year nightmare, Eakes said.
`` I feel relieved about this sentencing,'' she said. ``I feel pleased,
and the
victims' family can now have closure. They're doing as well as they can
be
expected to. They feel a sense of relief.''
At first glance, little has changed amid the winding drives and lush
yards of
the Woodridge neighborhood, which sits atop a hill between Interstate
405 and
121st Avenue Southeast in Bellevue.
A closer look might reveal a young cherry tree, planted by neighbors
behind
their Woodridge sign in the spring following the Wilson murders. An even
closer
look might reveal residents who feel a little less secure.
After last month's guilty verdict against Anderson, a neighbor tied four
white
ribbons around the cherry tree. The display brought back vivid memories
for
many who still live there.
`` We were staggered by the news when the murders happened,'' said
33-year
Woodridge resident Barbara Sauerbrey, who serves as president of the
community
association. ``We were extremely sorrowful about it.''
But Sauerbrey was never frightened for her own safety, she said. She
lived next
door to the Wilsons and was close to the family.
`` We've felt from the beginning the family was targeted; it wasn't
random,''
she said. ``Nothing terrible had ever happened; it was always peaceful
and
secluded here. But certainly this has created a sense of uneasiness.''
Sauerbrey said she was relieved to hear about Anderson's sentence. The
news
should help friends and relatives of the Wilsons move on, knowing
justice was
served.
`` His sentence was as just as we could ever hope for,'' she said.
``It's as
much as the system will allow.''
More than 600 exhibits of evidence and nearly 50 witnesses in Baranyi
and
Anderson's trials cumulatively revealed a disturbing subculture of
morbid
fantasy in which Anderson was the ring leader and Baranyi was his
right-hand
man. The pair often spent their nights chatting with friends over coffee
and
cigarettes at the Eastgate Denny's.
It was there and in other cafes, parks and the Sun Villa Lanes that
friends
said they listened as Anderson and Baranyi, who fancied himself a
demigod
called ``Slicer Thunderclap,'' boasted for hours about the horrific
multiple
murders they would one day commit.
The murders, they said, would come before their 18th birthdays so they
could
escape the death penalty.
At the time, no one took the two 17-year-olds seriously, even when
Anderson
showed some of his friends the aluminum baseball bats and kitchen knives
he
planned to use.
By the summer of 1996, a rift arose between Anderson and his longtime
mother-figure friend Kim Wilson, 20, over a $350 debt. Witnesses said
Wilson
was tired of giving Anderson money, paying for his meals or movies, so
she
wanted him to pay her back.
This annoyed Anderson, they said, and even though he signed a promissory
note
for the debt, he grew angrier with Wilson whenever she broached the
subject.
During the holiday season in December 1996, Wilson was home from San
Diego,
Calif., where she had spent the fall working with AmeriCorps. Witnesses
said
the day she was murdered she had run into Anderson at Factoria Mall and
asked
him about the debt.
In the months to follow, detectives determined that Anderson and Baranyi
somehow lured Wilson into Woodridge's water tower park and strangled her
with a
length of white nylon rope. After beating and kicking her until she was
dead,
they left her body half hidden in a thicket and went directly to her
home to
rob and murder the rest of her family.
Two days later, a pair of 8-year-old boys found Kim Wilson's body while
playing
in the park. Police soon discovered the blood-spattered interior of the
Wilsons' home and the remains of Bill and Rose Wilson and their daughter
Julia,
17.
Police arrested Baranyi within three days of the murders, after
interviewing
friends he shared with Kim Wilson. Two days later, they arrested
Anderson.
Jeff Gomes, Bellevue's lead detective in the case, said the teens were
remarkably efficient in murdering all four Wilsons quickly, without
raising the
suspicion of neighbors and leaving almost no physical evidence at either
crime
scene.
But where they failed was in not anticipating microscopic traces of
blood and
brain tissue linking Anderson's boots and a pair of shoelaces found in
Baranyi's bedroom to the crime.
In his 24 years as a police officer, Gomes said he has never before seen
such
carnage as what he discovered in the Wilson house.
That Sunday afternoon discovery began for him a seemingly interminable
test of
his emotions and investigative skills.
Detectives, forensics experts and prosecutors spent the next month
inside the
Wilson house poring over every inch, analyzing thousands of tiny blood
stains,
footprints and dents in the walls made by the baseball bats.
Their documentation became so cumbersome that by the time the trial
began, they
had to wheel their records into court each day on a cart.
`` It was tremendously stressful to make sense of all the information
that was
presented to prove their guilt,'' Gomes said Thursday. ``It had a
tremendous
emotional effect on me for three years. It was the worst murder in
Bellevue's
history.''
For Gomes, like the prosecutors he sat next to each day in court through
all
three trials, it became more and more difficult to leave the case behind
when
it was time to go home.
`` It's also affected my family,'' he said. ``They had to deal with my
long
working hours and my emotional state after a day in court. It affected
my
sleep. You always think about it, especially this case.''
Occasionally during his own testimony, Gomes was overcome by his own
emotions,
which sometimes became more than he could handle.
As for his take on the two young men he spent the last three years
trying to
understand, he said he'll never know for sure what lead them to such
acts.
`` I don't think I'll ever really know why they did it, but being close
to the
case, I'd say their lack of family structure, lack of foundation, had
something
to do with it,'' said Gomes, who has a 20-year-old daughter.
`` Most kids aren't like the kids in this group. They spent all hours of
the
morning sitting in Denny's and talking, with nothing to do. That shows
they
really have no direction in their lives. I don't think either of them
had a
goal.''
After the verdict, Gomes met with prosecutors Eakes and Baird at the
Pumphouse
restaurant in Bellevue to toast a job well done.
To extend the Bellevue Police Department's thanks to the two respected
attorneys, Gomes handed them each a plaque with this inscription: ``The
most
effective weapon against crime is cooperation.''
-------------------------------------------
The victims
William Wilson, 52, an accountant at Graham Steel in Kirkland known for
his
quiet sense of humor.
Rose Wilson, 46, who worked for the University of Washington libraries
and
always seemed willing to lend friends a listening ear.
Kim Wilson, 20, a Bellevue High School graduate who worked in the
AmeriCorps
program in San Diego and was home for the holidays when she was killed.
She had
known David Anderson since elementary school.
Julia Wilson, a 17-year-old Bellevue High School senior who wrote
poetry,
played the flute and planned to attend college. She briefly dated
Anderson the
summer before the murders.
--------------------------------------------
From shunned kids to deadly violence
By Noel S. Brady
Journal Reporter
Since the 1997 Wilson murders, there seemed to follow an ever-growing
list of
multiple homicides committed by disenfranchised teenagers.
From Pearl, Miss., to Littleton, Col., many parts of the country have
had their
own child-led massacres on the front pages of local newspapers.
For Dr. Bill Womack, 10-year resident psychiatrist at Echo Glen Juvenile
Detention Center in Snoqualmie, the disturbing trend reveals less about
problem
children than about a neglectful society.
He specializes in studying and understanding kids who kill."
Most of these kids have had some difficulty with feeling separated from
mainstream society,'' Womack said. ``They feel different. As a
consequence,
these kids are very angry.''
Anderson and Baranyi were popular in a circle of teenagers who spent
their time
fantasizing about primitive and brutal cultures led by magic and might.
They commanded respect among their peers by collecting knives, donning
black
clothes and waxing over morbid prophecies of murders they would one day
commit.
Womack recognizes this behavior as a symptom of kids looking for a place
in
society. Because they were shunned, he said, they lashed out at their
surroundings, hoping to make a mark even if it was negative.
Parents should look for these behavior patterns, take them seriously and
reopen
a dialogue with their kids, he said."
This subgroup has something to do with the way they feel about the
world,'' he
said. ``They feel `dissed'; they feel dismissed in some way. The fantasy
stuff
allows them a way to play out how they feel about society.''
The doctor lays part of the blame on popular culture that continues to
glorify
gratuitous violence. But maybe even more so, he said, adults who neglect
and
abuse children are to blame."
I'm concerned about how many kids are being abused,'' he said. ``I see
the
violence as a result of a society that doesn't take care of their kids.'
---------------------------------------------
HISTORY OF BELLEVUE'S WILSON MURDER CASE
Jan. 3, 1997 -- Kim Wilson is strangled near a water tower in the
Woodridge
neighborhood park, about a half-mile from her home; her family was
killed the
same night, according to police.
Jan. 5, 1997 -- Two boys discover Kim's body, fully clothed in bushes
off a
wooded trail. Police go to her parents' home to break the bad news and
discover
the bodies of William, Rose and 17-year-old Julia Wilson, who had been
beaten
and stabbed.
Jan. 6, 1997 -- More than 100 neighbors meet with police at a Woodridge
home,
where police try to allay fears that a random killer is at large.
Jan. 9, 1997 -- Hundreds gather at a second community meeting at
Woodridge
Elementary School. The same night, police arrest Alex Kevin Baranyi, 17.
He
confesses to the quadruple homicide, according to police, and claims he
had an
unnamed accomplice.
Jan. 13, 1997 -- A memorial for the Wilson family is held at St. Louise
Catholic Church in Bellevue.
Jan. 14, 1997 -- Police arrest David Carpenter Anderson, 17, Baranyi's
best
friend. Baranyi is charged with four counts of aggravated first-degree
murder.
Jan. 16, 1997 -- Anderson is charged with four counts of aggravated
first-degree murder.
Jan. 17, 1997 -- Baranyi pleads innocent.
Jan. 22, 1997 -- Anderson pleads innocent.
Feb. 6, 1997 -- Teens gather at Bellevue Downtown Park for a candlelight
vigil
for the slain family.
May 2, 1997 -- Woodridge residents plant a cherry tree in memory of the
Wilsons.
Nov. 4, 1998 -- Baranyi is convicted of four counts of aggravated
first-degree
murder after three hours of jury deliberations.
Jan. 8, 1999 -- Baranyi is sentenced to four consecutive life terms.
Jan. 25, 1999 -- Anderson's first trial on the same charges begins.
Feb. 23, 1999 -- Jurors begin deliberations.
March 4, 1999 -- Mistrial declared after jurors deadlock 11-1 for
conviction on
three of the murder counts and are headed toward a 10-2 split on the
fourth,
the death of Kim Wilson. Prosecutors say one holdout juror sabotaged
their case
by refusing to convict Anderson of anything.
Sept. 9, 1999 -- Holdout juror Lanette Inman of Kirkland files a
$350,000 claim
against King County, saying prosecutors wrongly blamed her for
deadlocking the
jury.
Oct. 11, 1999 -- Anderson's second murder trial begins.
Dec. 17, 1999 -- A jury convicts Anderson on all four counts of murder.
Jan. 7, 2000 -- The case is finally closed as Anderson is sentenced to
four
consecutive life terms.