Charles Ng trial - Update
Repo...@school.com
Torture Slaying Trial Resumes
By LARRY GERBER
SANTA ANA, Calif. (AP) -- A serial killer defendant has admitted to
abusing a
sex slave but denied charges he killed her or 11 other people in
gruesome sex
tortures and slayings.
Charles Ng, a 38-year-old Hong Kong native, is charged with killing two
infants, three women and seven men in 1984 and 1985. The case could go
to the
jury this week.
Testifying for a third day on Monday, against the advice of his lawyers,
Ng
opened the door for new prosecution evidence, including his jailhouse
cartoons
showing babies being killed and a woman being strangled during sex.
Ng stammered at times as prosecutor Sharlene Honnaka questioned him
about the
cartoons and about videotapes of captive women. The tapes show Ng and
friend
Leonard Lake taunting their prisoners at Lake's home in Wilseyville, in
the
Sierra Nevada foothills.
Honnaka asked Ng what he meant by telling the shackled and pregnant
Brenda
O'Connor: ``You can cry and stuff like the rest of them, but it won't do
you no
good.''
``What do you mean by 'the rest of them?''' Honnaka asked.
``There's no 'rest of them,''' Ng said. ``I just try to project that
seriousness... so she wouldn't resist.''
Ng said he felt ``pretty disturbed'' about how he treated O'Connor.
After doing
Lake's bidding for about a year, he decided to keep his distance, Ng
said.
The case is one of California's longest and costliest murder
prosecutions. Ng
was extradited from Canada after a six-year fight.
Lake committed suicide by taking cyanide in police custody in South San
Francisco in 1985 after a shoplifting incident. Ng has blamed the
killings on
him.
Lake left behind diaries outlining plans to kidnap and torture women, as
well
as a cell where sex slaves were kept. Human remains, some of them
burned, were
found buried near the cabin.
Honnaka introduced four brutal cartoons, which Ng admitted drawing in
collaboration with informant Maurice Laberge. Ng had earlier denied
discussing
infant murders with Laberge, who died in a car accident last May.
Ng told the jury that Laberge goaded him into making the cartoon. He
called
them satires with ``no basis in reality.''
The jury of nine women and three men wouldn't have seen the cartoons had
Ng not
insisted on taking the stand last week. His attorneys were about to
present
closing arguments.
Authorities say Ng and Lake imprisoned, raped and tortured the women
while
using the men's identities to take money from banks and credit accounts.
AP-NY-02-02-99
----------------------------------------------------------------
The following appears courtesy of the 2/2/99 online edition of The
Toronto
Sun newspaper:
Tuesday, February 2, 1999
Ng: Didn't realize murders occurred
By ALAN CAIRNS, TORONTO SUN
SANTA ANA, Calif. -- Alleged mass killer Charles Ng testified yesterday
that,
despite hearing a pregnant woman sex slave cry for her baby and her
husband and
helping bind, gag and bury two men's bodies, he didn't think the woman
was
going to be murdered.
"Two dead bodies later and you didn't confront (an associate) about what
had
happened to the men and what would happen to Brenda O'Connor?"
prosecutor
Sharlene Honnaka asked Ng of the events that occurred in April 1985.
Ng replied he didn't confront his partner Leonard Lake but was so
"concerned"
that, four days later, he left Lake's secluded cottage and returned to
San
Francisco.
"I was really disturbed about it afterwards and I didn't want anything
to do
with it any more," said Ng, who maintains he knew Lake was a criminal,
but not
a killer.
But Honnaka reminded Ng that, six weeks later, he again linked up with
Lake to
steal a vise at a South San Francisco lumber store.
On that occasion, Lake was arrested and later committed suicide while Ng
fled
to Canada.
Police would later dig up five bodies, 40 pounds of charred and smashed
human
bones and the charred liver of a child at Lake's cottage in the Sierra
Nevada
foothills.
Ng faces first-degree murder charges in the slayings of seven men, three
women
and two babies.
Prosecutors allege Ng and Lake formed a brotherhood that set out to
kidnap
people, rob them of their cars, money and home furnishings, kill the men
and
children and rape the women prior to killing them.
Ng's statement about Brenda O'Connor came at the climax of Honnaka's
cross-examination of him about events and statements on a chilling
videotape
which features O'Connor and another doomed sex slave, Kathleen Allen.
Ng said he helped Lake gain "compliance" from the two captive women to
help
Lake achieve his sex fantasies. He said that, on Lake's orders, he
helped Lake
bind, gag and bury the dead bodies of O'Connor's boyfriend, Lonnie Bond,
and
friend Scott Stapley. The videotape is the most damning evidence against
Ng in
an otherwise circumstantial case.
---------------------------------------------------------
The following appears courtesy of the 2/2/99 online edition of the
KNBC-TV,
local Los Angeles California NBC-TV affiliate station web site:
Ng cross-examination continues
SANTA ANA, Feb. 2 – Accused mass murderer Charles Ng testified Tuesday
that he
drew a “cartoon” of a microwaved baby on a woman’s plate as a satire on
allegations swirling around him, not as a metaphorical confession.
The drawing that Deputy Attorney General Sharlene Honnaka submitted
into
evidence was labeled “Slant’s Day Care.” Ng said that’s the name
jailhouse
informant Maurice Laberge gave him.
Besides the microwaved baby, a figure standing by a door and labeled
“Slant” is holding a gun and saying “bye-bye.”
Ng said he drew the cartoon, but it was not a confession.
“This cartoon came about because of some allegations by inmates,” Ng
said,
referring to the “taunts, harassment and verbal assaults” he was facing
in a
Canadian lockup.
Ng is charged with capital murder for the deaths of seven men, three
women
and two babies. At least six of the victims were members of families,
including
fathers, mothers and young children.
Ng fled to Canada after the April 1985 shoplifting arrest of his
alleged
accomplice Leonard Lake. Lake killed himself while in custody, and Ng
got
arrested for shoplifting in Canada in July 1985.
While jailed there, Ng got friendly with convicted robber Laberge,
who
later testified that Ng made a number of incriminating statements about
the
murders, and drew several “cartoons” that seemed to implicate him.
Laberge was supposed to serve a long term, but was released shortly
after
testifying against Ng during an extradition hearing.
Ng insists the cartoons he and Laberge collaborated on were satiric
and
designed to kill time.
Ng, testifying against the advice of his lawyers, said he never told
Laberge anything about killing two children. Outside the jury’s
presence,
Honnaka asked Judge John J. Ryan if she could introduce the drawings, to
show
Ng was lying. Deputy Public Defender William Kelley argued against
admission.
“There’s no evidence any children were microwaved,” Kelley said,
referring
to the microwave drawing. “We don’t know if Leonard Lake had a
microwave. All
it signifies is that Mr. Ng has a pretty macabre sense of satire.”
Lake, described as a survivalist marijuana dealer, took a fatal dose
of
cyanide in April 1985, apparently fearing the killings would be
uncovered.
Ng spent more than four years in a Calgary lockup trying to block
his
extradition back to California.
Canada, which does not allow capital punishment, returned him in
September
1991. The case was moved from Orange County in 1994 due to pretrial
publicity
in Northern California.
---------------------------------------------------------------------
The following appears courtesy of yesterday's Associated Press news
wire:
Feb. 1, 1999
Ng's testimony gives prosecution new scope
By Larry Gerber
ASSOCIATED PRESS
SANTA ANA -- Testifying against the advice of his lawyers, serial murder
defendant Charles Ng opened the door Monday for new prosecution
evidence,
including jailhouse cartoons showing babies being killed.
Ng admitted that he drew at least one of the four cartoons and said he
collaborated with a Canadian jailmate informant on the others. The
38-year-old
Hong Kong native is charged with killing two infants, three women and
seven men
in 1984 and 1985.
Under cross-examination by prosecutor Sharlene Honnaka, Ng had earlier
denied
discussing infant murders with the informant, Maurice Laberge, who died
in a
car accident last May.
Honnaka confronted Ng with a cartoon showing him holding a pillowcase
with a
baby in it, smashing it against something. Leonard Lake, an Ng buddy who
committed suicide, is depicted drowning a baby in a pillowcase. Laberge
also
appears in the cartoon, although he wasn't involved until meeting Ng in
prison
in Edmonton, Alberta, after the murders.
Another cartoon showed a character like Ng cooking a baby in a wok. Ng
admitted
lettering it with the rhyme "Daddy died, Momma cried, Baby fried."
"I can explain away," what the cartoons mean, Ng told the jury. Fellow
inmates
harassed him as a baby-killer because of news reports, and Laberge
goaded him
into making the cartoons as satires, Ng said.
"This cartoon is a relief for him and for me ...," Ng said. "Every time
I send
him a cartoon or we collaborate on a cartoon, he'd laugh."
Ng and Laberge were in adjoining cells in virtually solitary
confinement, he
said.
Ng also admitted lettering a particularly brutal cartoon of a man
strangling a
woman with pantyhose during sex.
"It became the backdrop of these cartoons, all the wild accusations," Ng
said.
The jury of nine women and three men wouldn't have seen the cartoons had
Ng not
insisted on taking the stand last week. His attorneys had blamed Lake
for all
the killings and were about to present closing arguments.
Ng has denied knowledge of any of the murders. Lake committed suicide by
taking
cyanide in police custody in South San Francisco in 1985 after a
shoplifting
incident. Ng fled the scene and went to Canada.
Lake left behind rambling diaries outlining plans to kidnap and torture
women,
as well as a cell where sex slaves were allegedly kept. Human remains,
some of
them burned, were found buried near the cabin.
Authorities say Ng and Lake imprisoned, raped and tortured the women
while
using the men's identities to take money from banks and credit accounts.
Honnaka pressed Ng on Monday about Kathy Allen, a San Francisco Bay area
supermarket clerk who disappeared April 14, 1985. She is one of two
women shown
being brutalized by Ng and Lake on videotape recorded by her captors.
The tape,
which the jury has seen, also shows Allen giving Ng a massage.
Ng said his memory was hazy about the episode.
"It wasn't a pleasant memory I would try to remember," Ng said.
"It didn't stick out in your mind that you had a woman that had been
kidnapped?" Honnaka said.
"My subconscious may be blocking it. That's my testimony," Ng said.
He also testified that "nothing sexual" occurred with Allen, although he
took a
shower with her. She was alive with Lake the last time he saw her, he
said,
although he wasn't sure what day that was.
Ng stammered several times on the stand as the prosecutor attempted to
cross
him up.
The case is one of California's longest and costliest murder
prosecutions. Ng
was extradited from Canada, largely on Laberge's testimony, after a
six-year
fight. The case was moved from Calaveras County to Orange County in 1994
on
grounds of extensive news coverage in Northern California.