Never See Them Again (32 page)
Read Never See Them Again Online
Authors: M. William Phelps
CHAPTER 61
W
HILE THE SPECIFICS
of the search for Snider were sketched out, the tip line received a call from someone who again shared information about Christine Paolilla that backed up what had been reported earlier. This time, though, the caller had claimed that Christine told her she and Snider had used a “forty-five and a nine millimeter” (either Christine or the caller was wrong about the .45âit was a .38) during the murders, something Christine had said she knew nothing about. The only other important piece of new information from the caller was that Christine had run out of the house
with
Chris Snider, who then convinced her to go back in and “open fire” on all of them to make certain they were dead. But that once she got back inside the house and realized she was out of bullets, seeing Rachael “crawling on the floor,” Christine beat her to death with the pistol.
HILE THE SPECIFICS
of the search for Snider were sketched out, the tip line received a call from someone who again shared information about Christine Paolilla that backed up what had been reported earlier. This time, though, the caller had claimed that Christine told her she and Snider had used a “forty-five and a nine millimeter” (either Christine or the caller was wrong about the .45âit was a .38) during the murders, something Christine had said she knew nothing about. The only other important piece of new information from the caller was that Christine had run out of the house
with
Chris Snider, who then convinced her to go back in and “open fire” on all of them to make certain they were dead. But that once she got back inside the house and realized she was out of bullets, seeing Rachael “crawling on the floor,” Christine beat her to death with the pistol.
Here was a third party now telling that same story.
Harris hoped another piece of the puzzle was uncovered when he heard that the lab had finished its examination of Christine's computers. HPD's Digital Forensic Laboratory reported that three computers and an external hard drive taken from Christine's residence and the hotel room, where she and Justin were holed up, contained evidence. There was no smoking gun, just a bit of additional proof corroborating what witnesses were saying.
For one, Christine had utilized a program called “Registry Mechanic,” which cleansed and destroyed traces of any computer activity. “While the program,” Harris was told, “is somewhat of an âantiforensic' tool, it did leave some traces.”
The lab could not find any communication between the tipster Waco and another guy Christine had opened up to: “Dave.” But it did uncover that Christine was registered on a porn site and that she had downloaded several hard-core porn photographs.
Beyond any normal computer activity, “Nothing of relevance to this investigation,” the lab concluded, “was discovered.”
CHAPTER 62
D
URING THE EARLY-MORNING
hours of August 5, 2006, the team in Greenville searched the town park and found nothing. The SCSARDA supervisor called Brian Harris, who ended up staying in Houston, despite an eagerness to be back in Greenville, overseeing the search. She explained what had happened at the park.
URING THE EARLY-MORNING
hours of August 5, 2006, the team in Greenville searched the town park and found nothing. The SCSARDA supervisor called Brian Harris, who ended up staying in Houston, despite an eagerness to be back in Greenville, overseeing the search. She explained what had happened at the park.
“You need to go to that area I pointed to on the maps,” Harris explained. It was that wooded section near Haley's home where Harris and McCorvey had stood while out there the previous week.
“We'll head out there now,” she said.
Harris waited.
Within ten minutes of the dogs searching that area, they found Chris Snider's bloated and badly decomposed remains.
“A lot of bones,” said one source. “Bloated and nasty. A lot of animals had come up to him during those two weeks and nibbled at him.”
Snider had burrowed into a deeply settled area of brush, “under a canopy of kudzu vegetation, approximately twenty feet from a creek that ran through the center of a wooded area.” He had gotten himself comfortable. There was a two-liter bottle of Coke nearby and, of course, several empty pill bottles scattered around him.
Greenville wanted DNA confirmation.
Harris sent Snider's dental records.
It was Chris Snider, all right.
At 2:43
P.M.
, Saturday, August 5, 2006, the Greenville City Police Department issued a media release, basically saying that
while acting on a lead developed by Houston Police investigators, cadaver K-9s were utilized ⦠[and] did locate a male decomposed body meeting the same physical description as [Chris] Snider under kudzu in a deep wooded area behind Westview Avenue.
P.M.
, Saturday, August 5, 2006, the Greenville City Police Department issued a media release, basically saying that
while acting on a lead developed by Houston Police investigators, cadaver K-9s were utilized ⦠[and] did locate a male decomposed body meeting the same physical description as [Chris] Snider under kudzu in a deep wooded area behind Westview Avenue.
That part of the saga was over.
CHAPTER 63
C
HRISTINE PAOLILLA WAS
denied bond. Yet for Christine, if she was going to be using the “he made me do it” defense, Snider's death was going to help her perhaps win that argument in court. A dead man could not defend himself. Nor could he laugh when his girlfriend made the claim that he placed her hand over the trigger of a gun and made her fire the rounds that killed four people.
HRISTINE PAOLILLA WAS
denied bond. Yet for Christine, if she was going to be using the “he made me do it” defense, Snider's death was going to help her perhaps win that argument in court. A dead man could not defend himself. Nor could he laugh when his girlfriend made the claim that he placed her hand over the trigger of a gun and made her fire the rounds that killed four people.
Months went by as both sides prepared for Christine's trial.
On April 20, 2007, Christine filed a writ of habeas corpus with the Fourteenth Court of Appeals requesting bail, spelling out for the court why she had been denied back in July (2006) was a mistake.
On May 9, 2007, the court set a $500,000 bail for the accused multiple murderer.
Christine argued it was too high. She claimed $150,000 was a figure she could handle.
The only witness Christine's defense team called at the hearing to discuss her bail being lowered was Tom Dick, Christine's stepfather, a man who had walked into Lori and Christine's lives one day and had dealt with nothing but a troubled kid ever since.
Tom Dick said Christine would “reside with” him and Lori if she was set free on a lowered bond. He explained that he had visited Christine at least fifty times since she had been incarcerated; Lori at least 150 times (all within just ten months). Christine was currently on a cocktail of meds: Adderall, Trileptal, Trazodone, and Zoloft. This was the favored concoction of recovering heroin addicts.
Beyond the fairly routine (boring) court-inspired arguments that both sides presented, the most interesting facts to come out of the hearing related to Christine's finances. All that cash her dead dad had left her by osmosis (the peerless trust-fund baby that she was) was gone, according to Tom Dick, who claimed it was $400,000, not $360,000, which Christine had been telling everyone. At the time of Christine's arrest, Dick said during the hearing, Christine had $140,000 left in her trust, which was turned over to her attorneys for legal fees. Christine owned a condo, which Dick said he bought from her for $80,000, more money that went to legal fees.
Dick told the court that the most he and Lori could hand over for bond was $75,000. Prior to the hearing, however, he had filed paperwork indicating they could afford $150,000.
“The affidavit was based on paying ten percent of the bond,” Dick clarified.
There was still no indication whether the state would seek the death penalty; although, it was known by now that if Christine was convicted of capital murder, she would automatically receive a life sentence, simply because a U.S. Supreme Court ruling forbade capital punishment for anyone aged seventeen and under at the time of the crime. This was a category that Christine, luckily, had fallen into. Unless, that is, the prosecutor was able to find a way around it.
Citing the fact that there was no doubt Christine was a flight riskâif not for the severity of the murders alone, the fact of her own addiction to heroin and cocaineâthe appeals court denied her request.
Christine was going to stay in jail while the courts decided when and where to try her on four counts of capital murder.
PART FIVE
THE NORMAL WE KNEW WILL NEVER BE
CHAPTER 64
A
FTER A YEAR
and several months of motions, hearings, and filings by both sides, Christine Paolilla's trial was finally set to begin in early September 2008. It had been over five years since the kids were murdered; yet the pain and loss experienced by family members was as raw and nerve-shattering as it had been back on July 18, 2003, when they got the call that had changed their lives forever.
FTER A YEAR
and several months of motions, hearings, and filings by both sides, Christine Paolilla's trial was finally set to begin in early September 2008. It had been over five years since the kids were murdered; yet the pain and loss experienced by family members was as raw and nerve-shattering as it had been back on July 18, 2003, when they got the call that had changed their lives forever.
Christine Paolilla was now a twenty-two-year-old woman, with a few years of living behind bars under her belt. Several sources reported that Christine had fallen into prison life and taken to the new lifestyle rather congenially, even scoring herself a very large and aptly named girlfriend, “Big Momma,” whom Christine was seen having lesbian sex with out in the open on several occasions. She had gained some weightânot too muchâand looked healthier than she ever had. When in court Christine was able to fix herself up nice with makeup and a wig, obviously with the hope of coming across as sweet and demure. One lawyer later described her as “a babe in the woods, like they tried to portray her. They dressed her up in those cute little pink outfits . . . and, you know, the jury [was going] to see right through it.” The idea was to make Christine look like the child she supposedly was when the crimes had been committedâa child, as it were, under the wielding and abusive hand of Chris Snider, the true villain in this tragedy. Some tears would work to her advantage; although there was a fine line between how much emotion she could project believably. A bit of temerity, too, might help. She shouldn't sit stoically, as if the proceedings were merely a “day in the life.” She should show interest. She should sit up straight. She should stick to her story of being intimidated and controlled by Chris Snider.
Harris County District Court judge Mark Kent Ellis ran a tight courtroom. Ellis wasn't a judge who sat back and waited for something to happen; he spent a lot of time watching, making sure that things went accordingly, in the eyes of the law. Formerly with the district attorney's office, Judge Ellis, a Republican, had cofounded the Harris County Mental Health Court, which helped mentally ill criminals complete probation and continue treatment after the dues of their crimes had been paid. Ellis wore glasses underneath straight black hair, graying slightly on both sides. He had been an assistant district attorney (ADA) and had a private practice at one time. If the people of Houston, Texas, wanted neutrality and fairness, this judge was the one who could give it to them without condition.
One of the two lawyers in charge of prosecuting Christine, Assistant District Attorney (ADA) Rob Freyer (pronounced “frair”) was a man who held little back when speaking in terms of those he saw on the wrong side of the law. As any great prosecutor should, Freyer had a reputation for going forcefully after criminalsâhowever big or smallâwith an iron fist he did not mind smashing on the table when speaking of them in open court. Some defense attorneys called him “Ag Rob,” a play on his name and the crime of aggravated robbery because he did not like to cut deals. Freyer was fit, trim, healthy-looking. He sported closely cropped black hair and dressed sharply. The much-liked prosecutor had taken on the case only after a colleague, who had parked her car one morning in the garage, stepped out and then dropped dead of a heart attack. Freyer had been in the DA's office since 1995, beginning his career as an ADA in 1997. Leading up to the Paolilla case, he had handled some one hundred felony jury trials.
Freyer's biggest worry heading into trial was not convicting Christine Paolilla; he was confident about doing that. It was getting the case in before he left the office; his departure slated for that December.
“I wanted to make sure that the voices of the victims' families were heard,” Freyer later said. “Through [ADA] Mr. Tom Goodhart [his co-counsel] and myself . . . I wanted to make sure that we could at least get some satisfaction under the law that she was held responsible for what she did.”
To Freyer's way of thinking, there was never a doubt that Christine Paolilla walked into the Rowell house on that day with the intention to kill. She was evil personified. A dark and twisted human being who had killed four innocent kids.
“Her explanation of this crime was insulting,” Freyer said, “. . . to anybody's intelligence.”
Jury selection began back on September 8, but then something out of everyone's hands happened, pushing the the trial (once again) two-plus weeks out, or the end of September.
Mother Nature.
Hurricane Ike had made landfall near Galveston on September 13, 2008, as a Category 2 storm, with a Category 5 equivalent storm surge. Hurricane-force winds from Ike extended some 120 miles inland. It was one of the most significant hurricanes to hit land in Texas, ever. With the Ike forecast, the court postponed the trial. As the judge explained on September 30, when opening arguments were (re)set to begin, Ike had closed down the courthouse during the week of the thirteenth, but set the trial back another two weeks until the week of the twenty-eighth because of scheduling conflicts.
Nonetheless, here it was, time to begin, with a jury selected back on September 9.
“So,” Judge Ellis explained, “we've had communication about the jury since the time the case was delayed. We actually brought them in on the eleventh and told themâI told them in personâthat we were going to delay the trial. And at that point, we weren't sure how long, but we wanted to let the storm play itself out. The communication with the jury in the time between now and then has either been by way of the coordinator or the bailiff, and, basically, just to apprise them of what the court settings would be.”
The judge concluded that he'd had no “personal contact” with any of the jurors. Then he spoke about a letter he had received, excusing one juror, who was quickly replaced. Christine Paolilla's attorneys had filed a motion for a mistrial on the grounds of the jury having all this time between being picked and the start of the trial. Defense attorneys loved to do this: hold things up even more. The fact of the matter remained: it was time to put the gloves on and get it on. The trial had been pushed back and delayed long enough.
Ellis had the jury settled in the courtroom, where he could question each of them to see if there had been any problems during the break. He made a point to say how every person in the room had “suffered” because of the hurricane, “some more than others, and that certainly has been stressful to me, I'll say honestly, and to other people involved in this case. I'm sure it had been stressful to y'all.”
The jury was ready to move forward.
The state asked the judge to dismiss the motion for mistrial.
“The motion is denied.”
Christine sat transfixed. She wore what would become a trademark scarf over the top of her wig, Mary Tyler Mooreâlike. The court read the charges a grand jury had agreed with, and then asked, “Miss Paolilla, to the charge of capital murder, how do you plead, guilty or not guilty?”
“Not guilty,” she said without hesitation, and then sat down to the judge's order.
Rob Freyer took a nod from the judge, indicating that it was his turn to stand and deliver the state's opening argument. As any good ADA knew, the object with the opening was to keep it short and to the point. If you made big claims, you had better provide that evidence during trial to back them up, or you'd be taken to task. Brevity, Freyer was well aware, could carry his argument a long way.
“What the evidence is going to show in this case,” Freyer began, “a long and very twisted tale, is a different form of wreckage, a different form of suffering, and a different form of pain.”
Mike DeGeurin, Christine's attorney, objected.
“Overruled.”
“And if in the course of my attempting, or trying to attempt, to summarize all the facts,” Freyer continued, “if for some reason they are out of place or jumbled up in some way, I apologize for that. Because I did not author this scene! I did not
write
this script. The evidence will show
she
did.”
write
this script. The evidence will show
she
did.”
He walked over and pointed at Christine Paolilla, nearly close enough to put his finger in her face. She sat with a look of total embarrassment and hatred for him on her pinched face. There was so much drama surrounding the move on Freyer's part that defense attorney Mike DeGeurin walked in back of his client, put his arms on his hips, and objected.
“The evidence will show,” Freyer continued, walking away from the defendant, “that she and Christopher Snider did these horrible thingsâ”
“Again, Your Honor,” DeGeurin, said, “argument and not an opening statement. I
object
to it.”
object
to it.”
“Overruled.”
“The evidence will show that on July 18, 2003, she and a guy named Christopher Sniderâhis name will come up quite a bit in this case. You will learn a lot about Christopher Snider. They were dating. They decided to take it upon themselves to drive from her house in Friendswood, thirty-five miles, to Christopher Snider's house in Crosby, Texas. Now, she later told the police after she was arrested, three years later, that she didn't know why they were going there. She later told the police she thought they were going there so he could get his fix on more drugs. She also didn't expect that as the events played out, that the guns that [would be] used to kill Rachael Koloroutis, Marcus Precella, Adelbert Sánchez, and Tiffany Rowell were found three years later. So, they drive from his house in Crosby, Texas, Christine and her boyfriend, nobody else. She's driving in her car. They go to a house in Clear Lake. The evidence will showâand by her own admissionâshe knew Rachael and Tiffany. She, in her
own
words, called them her, quote, âbest friends.' She had their confidence. She had their trust. She had their admiration. And they walked up to this house [on] Millbridge, Rachael Koloroutis opened the door, and they started shooting. They started shooting a lot. They started shooting with fury, the evidence will show. . . . We know for a fact that over twenty-one rounds were shot inside that house.”
own
words, called them her, quote, âbest friends.' She had their confidence. She had their trust. She had their admiration. And they walked up to this house [on] Millbridge, Rachael Koloroutis opened the door, and they started shooting. They started shooting a lot. They started shooting with fury, the evidence will show. . . . We know for a fact that over twenty-one rounds were shot inside that house.”
It was damaging for Christine to hear how the crime was being played out, right here in front of her peers, in such a dramatic way. She was going to be crawling uphill throughout the trial. How could she explain that she was
forced
into pulling the trigger on one of the weapons that killed four people? It seemed an impossible task and an unbelievable scenario.
forced
into pulling the trigger on one of the weapons that killed four people? It seemed an impossible task and an unbelievable scenario.
Freyer went on about the facts the state would present as Christine's attorney objected at random intervals. The judge sustained one objection after Freyer went a bit too far, telling the jury he was going to explain what was going on inside the defendant's mind at the time she fired the weapon.
But then, to put a bit more of a motive into play, Freyer talked about the fact that Tiffany Rowell
wasn't
pistol-whipped on that night. Tiffany had been, instead, shot in the face, twice.
wasn't
pistol-whipped on that night. Tiffany had been, instead, shot in the face, twice.
“The evidence will show . . . that Tiffany was shot
three
times with a thirty-eight revolver and at least three or four times with a nine millimeter. Marcus Precella was shot twice with a thirty-eight and at least three times from a nine millimeter.”
three
times with a thirty-eight revolver and at least three or four times with a nine millimeter. Marcus Precella was shot twice with a thirty-eight and at least three times from a nine millimeter.”
The jury sat and pictured a bloodbath: four teens going down in a hail of gunfire, with no chance to react.
“They started shooting the moment Rachael Koloroutis opened that door,” Freyer pointed out. “Look at all the shell casings in the foyer!”
Freyer made another important suggestion. Forget about “how pretty she looks,” he said, again pointing fiercely at Christine. He wanted jurors not to focus on how Christine
looked
âall
purty
and done up goodâor how young she was at the time of the crime. No! Look at the brutality and the end result of what the crime scene showed investigators. The ADA seemed to imply with his tone and demeanor and word choice that a vicious sociopath had showed a total disregard for human life, toward two girls she had bequeathed her undivided love and friendship upon. It was even “unfair,” Freyer noted, to refer to the house as a crime scene, because it “was outright carnage.”
looked
âall
purty
and done up goodâor how young she was at the time of the crime. No! Look at the brutality and the end result of what the crime scene showed investigators. The ADA seemed to imply with his tone and demeanor and word choice that a vicious sociopath had showed a total disregard for human life, toward two girls she had bequeathed her undivided love and friendship upon. It was even “unfair,” Freyer noted, to refer to the house as a crime scene, because it “was outright carnage.”
Carnage would become a popular word for law enforcement, a sort of mantra referred to throughout the trial.
From there the ADA went through the timeline of his evidence: the Lackners, those neighbors who spotted two people and were able to produce a drawing; Nancy Vernau; and then how it all tied together with what Christine Paolilla later admitted to Justin Rott, a man who could not have known several facts unless she had told him.
Freyer's bottom line came next. When you are offered the opportunity in life to get away with something, and that something is quadruple murder, what do you do? You use the “age-old and most convenient excuseâthat is, you
blame
the person that's not here.”
blame
the person that's not here.”
Chris Snider, after all, could not speak from the grave.
“ âHe made me do it,' ” Freyer mocked Christine. “You will know based upon evidence, and applying your common sense, that there is no way whatsoever that one person did all of this.”
If there was one thing Christine's attorneys could not accuse the state of, it was not being thorough enough, as Freyer made clear by his next statement: “They (HPD) chased down an investigation that lasted
three
years and involved no fewer than two hundred to three hundred interviews from witnesses in South Texas, Bastrop, Texas, Beaumont, Texas, Boston, Massachusetts, Nashville, Tennessee, Louisville, Kentucky, [and] Jacksonville, Florida. They went all over the place to seek justice for those four kids. What's ironicâand there's no way they could have known this at the timeâis that the answer was right there in front of them the entire time, through no fault of their own. Because when Rachael Koloroutis died, the
evidence
will show, guess whose picture was in her wallet?”
three
years and involved no fewer than two hundred to three hundred interviews from witnesses in South Texas, Bastrop, Texas, Beaumont, Texas, Boston, Massachusetts, Nashville, Tennessee, Louisville, Kentucky, [and] Jacksonville, Florida. They went all over the place to seek justice for those four kids. What's ironicâand there's no way they could have known this at the timeâis that the answer was right there in front of them the entire time, through no fault of their own. Because when Rachael Koloroutis died, the
evidence
will show, guess whose picture was in her wallet?”
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