Ray and Faye Copeland were two serial killers from Missouri that are a bit odd for a number of reasons including the fact that they were married and for their ages by the time they would go on trial for multiple murders. In this article on My Crime Library we are going to take a closer look at Ray and Faye Copeland.
Ray And Faye Copeland Early Years
Ray Copeland was born in Oklahoma on December 30, 1914 to a poor family and from an early age turned to a life of crime. Ray would be arrested and sent to jail in 1939 for forging a check. Once released Ray would meet Faye Wilson and the pair would soon marry and have a number of children. Ray Copeland would serve a number of jail sentences for theft and forging checks causing the Copeland family to constantly move from one place to another.
Ray And Faye Copeland Murders
To help with the Copeland family farm Ray would hire farmhands to purchase cattle, Ray could not as he was known as a thief, with bad checks and soon after the purchase was done the farmhands would disappear. Ray would sell the cattle quickly. Unfortunately the scam was quickly noticed by authorities and he was soon arrested again.
Once out of jail Ray Copeland would resume the scam but this time he would use farmhands that had no connection to him. One of the farmhands would later go to police and tell them about the scam and that he had seen human bones on the property. The police decided to investigate Ray Copeland
When the police searched the Copeland farm they found the remains of several people. Ray and Faye Copeland would be arrested and charged with multiple murders
Ray And Faye Copeland Trial
The police came to the conclusion that Ray Copeland had hired the farmhands to purchase cattle and after the deal was done would murder the individuals. However Faye Copeland role in the murders was not clear.
Ray Copeland would be quickly convicted and sentenced to multiple death sentences.
Faye Copeland lawyers tried to put forth a defense that she was innocent of the charges and was an abused woman who was controlled by her husband. The defense did not work and she as well was sentenced to multiple death sentences.
Ray And Faye Copeland Deaths
Ray Copeland would die from natural causes in October, 1993 while he awaited execution on Missouri Death Row
Faye Copeland remained on Missouri Death Row until 1999 when her death sentences were overturned and she was resentenced to multiple life without parole sentences. In 2002 Faye Copeland suffered a massive stroke that left her unable to speak and partially paralyzed. The Governor of Missouri would grant a medical pardon a few weeks later allowing Copeland to be moved to a nursing home where she would die of natural causes at the age of 82 on December 23, 2003.
Ray And Faye Copeland Photos
Ray And Faye Copeland Videos
Ray And Faye Copeland More News
Faye Copeland, a convicted killer once considered the nation’s oldest woman on death row, has died at a nursing home where she had been released on medical parole, the Missouri Department of Corrections said Tuesday. She was 82.
Copeland was convicted and sentenced to death along with her husband for the murders of five transients as part of a late-1980s livestock swindle at their farm near Chillicothe.
She was the oldest woman on death row until a federal court commuted her sentence in 1999 to life in prison. Copeland suffered a stroke in August 2002 that left her partially paralyzed and unable to speak. She was paroled a couple of weeks later to nursing home in her hometown.
Copeland died Sunday at the Morningside Center nursing home from what Livingston County coroner Scott Lindley described Tuesday as natural causes.
Authorities contended Ray and Faye Copeland used transients in a scheme to buy cattle with bad checks, then killed the men and buried them in shallow graves. Faye Copeland’s defense during trial was that her husband committed the killings without her knowledge and that she was bystander who was the victim of battered woman syndrome.
But jurors found Faye Copeland’s guilty after prosecutors presented a handwritten list of farm helpers in her writing. She had written the names because Ray Copeland was illiterate.
Twelve of the names had scrawled X’s by them. Five of those men turned up dead, and prosecutors believed three others who were missing also died.
Rep. Kenny Hulshof, R-Mo., who before he was elected to the U.S. House helped prosecute the Copelands in separate trials, said in 1999 that the list of names showed Faye Copeland was more of an accomplice than she claimed.
Copeland had pressed for her release since she was imprisoned
Lisa Montgomery would be executed for the murder of Bobbi Jo Stinnett on January 13, 2021 by lethal injection.
According to court documents Lisa Montgomery had struck up a friendship with Bobbi Jo Stinnett over dog shows and on a website regarding rat terriers.
Soon the two women were emailing each other and Lisa Montgomery would tell Bobbi Jo Stinnett that she was pregnant as well and the two women would discuss their pregnancies (Lisa Montgomery was not pregnant.)
On December 16, 2004 Lisa Montgomery would go over to Bobbi Jo Stinnett house and strangle the woman to death. Montgomery would cut the fetus from the woman’s body and fled from the home.
Bobby Jo Stinnett mother would discover her an hour later and would call paramedics however they were unable to revive her.
Lisa Montgomey would tell her husband that she had gone into labor and given birth. Police would arrest Montgomery at her home the next day.
Lisa Montgomery would go on trial, be convicted and sentenced to death. On January 13, 2021 Lisa would be executed by lethal injection
Lisa Montgomery Videos
Lisa Montgomery More News
Lisa Montgomery, 52, was executed by lethal injection at the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre Haute, Indiana, and pronounced dead at 1:31 a.m. Wednesday.
Lisa Montgomery was the first woman to be executed by the federal government since 1953 and was the only woman on death row.The Supreme Court denied a last-ditch effort late Tuesday by her defense attorneys who argued that she should have been given a competency hearing to prove her severe mental illness, which would have made her ineligible for the death penalty.
She was the 11th federal death row inmate to be executed by the Trump administration after a 17-year hiatus in federal executions.”The government stopped at nothing in its zeal to kill this damaged and delusional woman,” her attorney, Kelley Henry, said in a statement. “Lisa Montgomery’s execution was far from justice.”Montgomery’s attorneys, family and supporters had pleaded with President Donald Trump to read their clemency petition and make an executive decision to commute her sentence to life without the possibility of parole.
Lisa Montgomery was sentenced to death in 2008 by a Missouri jury for the 2004 murder of a pregnant woman, cutting the fetus out and kidnapping it. The baby survived.
A federal judge granted Montgomery a stay of execution Tuesday for a competency hearing — just hours before she was scheduled to be executed.”The Court was right to put a stop to Lisa Montgomery’s execution,” Henry said in a statement. “As the court found, Mrs. Montgomery ‘made a strong showing’ of her current incompetence to be executed. Mrs. Montgomery has brain damage and severe mental illness that was exacerbated by the lifetime of sexual torture she suffered at the hands of caretakers.””The Eighth Amendment prohibits the execution of people like Mrs. Montgomery who, due to their severe mental illness or brain damage, do not understand the basis for their executions. Mrs. Montgomery is mentally deteriorating, and we are seeking an opportunity to prove her incompetence,” Henry added.But the Supreme Court denied the effort and pleas to President Trump were unsuccessful.
Two more executions are scheduled this week, for Corey Johnson on Thursday and Dustin Higgs on Friday. Both of their executions have been halted by a federal court judge as the men are still recovering from Covid-19. Prosecutors intend to appeal the ruling on Higgs and Johnson, according to court documents.
Lisa Montgomery, a convicted killer who strangled a pregnant woman in 2004 and then cut the unborn baby from her womb, was executed in a federal prison in Indiana early Wednesday. She was the first woman executed in the federal system in nearly seven decades.
Lisa Montgomery, 52, was pronounced dead at 1:31 a.m. Wednesday after receiving a lethal injection at the federal prison complex in Terre Haute, Indiana, the Federal Bureau of Prisons said.
Earlier Wednesday, the Supreme Court lifted an appeals court stay that had blocked the execution, and it denied a request for a stay filed by Montgomery’s attorneys that raised mental illness concerns.
“The craven bloodlust of a failed administration was on full display tonight,” Kelley Henry, an attorney for Montgomery, said in a statement.
Henry has said that Lisa Montgomery suffered from severe mental illness that was “exacerbated by the lifetime of sexual torture she suffered at the hands of caretakers,” and her lawyers sought a chance to prove her incompetence.
The execution comes in the waning days of the Trump administration, which in 2019 announced plans to carry out the first federal executions in 17 years. President-elect Joe Biden has suggested he would put a moratorium on the federal death penalty.
Lisa Montgomery was initially set to be executed in December, but the date was delayed after her attorneys, who are based in Nashville, Tennessee, contracted the coronavirus amid traveling to Texas and working on her case.
The spread of Covid-19 across prisons, including at the Indiana facility where all federal executions take place, contributed to increased criticism over the resumption of the federal death penalty last year, even as states put a halt to executions.
With Wednesday’s lethal injection, the Trump administration has put 11 people to death over the past seven months, the most executions in a presidential lame-duck period in more than 130 years.
Montgomery’s execution, which had been planned for Tuesday, was one of three scheduled by the Department of Justice this week.
In a ruling Tuesday, Judge Tanya S. Chutkan of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, ruled to stay the two other federal executions, those of Dustin Higgs and Corey Johnson.
Johnson, convicted of killing seven people related to drug trafficking in Virginia, and Higgs, convicted of ordering the murders of three women in Maryland, both tested positive for Covid-19 last month.
Chutkan wrote in her decision that it is not in the public interest to execute the two men.
In December 2004, Lisa Montgomery, then 36 and living in Kansas, crossed state lines to the Missouri home of Bobbie Jo Stinnett, whom she had met at a dog show, federal prosecutors said. Stinnett was eight months pregnant.
Lisa Montgomery strangled Stinnett with a rope and used a kitchen knife she had brought from home to remove the fetus, according to court documents. The baby girl survived. Montgomery tried to pass her off as her own, but was quickly arrested and later convicted by a jury and sentenced unanimously to death.
Lisa Montgomery had been incarcerated in an all-female federal prison in Fort Worth, Texas, where staff is trained to deal with mental health issues. Her lawyers said that they weren’t arguing that she didn’t deserve to be punished, but rather that the jury never fully learned of her severe mental illnesses as diagnosed by doctors.
In a nearly 7,000-page clemency petition filed this month, her lawyers say her mother’s alcoholism caused her to be born brain-damaged and “resulted in incurable and significant psychiatric disabilities.” They also detailed Montgomery’s claims of physical abuse, rape and torture at the hands of her stepfather and others and being sex trafficked by her mother.
“Everything about this case is overwhelmingly sad,” the petition says. “As human beings we want to turn away. It is easy to call Mrs. Montgomery evil and a monster, as the Government has. She is neither.”
Diane Mattingly, an older sister of Lisa Montgomery, told reporters last week that she, too, suffered sexual abuse in the home before being placed in foster care. She has been vocal in recent months that her sister’s life should be spared.
“I went into a place where I was loved and cared for and shown self-worth,” Mattingly said. “I had a good foundation. Lisa did not, and she broke. She literally broke.”
In October, the Justice Department described the case as an “especially heinous” murder. The Missouri community where her victim had lived gathered last month to remember Stinnett, with some expressing support for Montgomery’s execution.
The U.S. government last executed a female inmate in 1953, when Bonnie Brown Heady of Missouri was put to death for the kidnapping and murder of a young boy in a ransom plot
Lisa Montgomery, the only woman on federal death row, died by lethal injection early Wednesday after the Supreme Court vacated several lower-court rulings, clearing the way for her to become the first female prisoner to be put to death by the U.S. government since 1953.
It was midnight when the Supreme Court ended a day of legal challenges, setting aside what Department of Justice attorneys called “unwarranted” obstacles to the execution of Montgomery for a “crime of staggering brutality.” By 1:31 a.m. ET Wednesday, she was pronounced dead.
Just ahead of Montgomery’s execution at the Federal Corrections Complex in Terre Haute, Ind., her attorney, Kelley Henry, said her client’s death by lethal injection was far from justice, as no other woman who had committed a similar crime faced the death penalty.
In 2004, Lisa Montgomery drove from Kansas to Missouri, ostensibly to purchase a puppy from Bobbie Jo Stinnett, a 23-year-old dog breeder who was eight months pregnant. Instead, Montgomery strangled her, cut her fetus from her womb and tried to pass the surviving baby off as her own.
Four years later, she was sentenced to death.
Until Montgomery’s death overnight Wednesday, it had been nearly 70 years since a woman on federal death row had been executed.
The execution followed an intense, 11th-hour, court battle over Montgomery’s fate.
U.S. District Judge Patrick Hanlon in Indiana granted a stay of execution, citing the need to determine whether she was too mentally ill to be executed.
On Tuesday, an appellate court in Chicago reversed that decision, paving the way for the execution to go forward. But in a separate ruling, an appeals court in Washington, D.C., blocked the execution to give time for hearings on whether the Department of Justice had given sufficient notice of Montgomery’s execution date, which was set for Tuesday. The Department of Justice challenged that ruling.
A whiplash of legal challenges and decisions continued throughout the day until the Supreme Court’s midnight ruling allowed the federal Bureau of Prisons to proceed with the plan to end Montgomery’s life by lethal injection. Montgomery’s lawyers had also filed a clemency petition asking President Trump to commute her sentence to life in prison, to no avail.
In preparation, authorities had transferred Lisa Montgomery on Monday from the federal women’s prison in Texas where she had been held for more than a decade to the Indiana facility. The family of the woman she murdered, had traveled there as well to witness Montgomery’s death.
Henry, Montgomery’s attorney, said throughout the legal proceedings that no one was excusing Montgomery’s actions, but that her troubled life provided context for the crime. She said her client had brain damage and severe mental illness that was exacerbated by a lifetime of abuse, including child sex trafficking, gang rape and physical abuse largely at the hands of family members.
She said the Constitution, “forbids the execution of a person who is unable to rationally understand her execution,” Henry said in a statement shortly after the Supreme Court issued its final order.
“The government stopped at nothing in its zeal to kill this damaged and delusional woman,” the attorney said.
Montgomery’s execution is one of three that the Justice Department had scheduled during this final full week of the Trump administration. The two others were halted by a federal judge on Tuesday.
Cory Johnson, 52, was scheduled for execution on Thursday for his involvement in the murder of seven people nearly three decades ago. Dustin John Higgs, 55, was scheduled to be put to death on Friday for his involvement in the murder of three women nearly 20 years ago. Both have tested positive for COVID-19 and the judge ordered their executions be delayed until mid-March to allow them to recover. The Justice Department has appealed that order.
If the judge’s delay is overturned, those executions could be the last to occur for the foreseeable future. Senate Democrats unveiled legislation Monday that would abolish the federal death penalty, and President-elect Joe Biden has said he wants to eliminate it as well.
In 2019, the Justice Department announced it would revive federal executions after a 16-year hiatus. Under the Trump administration, 10 men have been executed since July 2020.
Now one woman joins the list of those put to death.
Alyssa Bustamante was fifteen years old when she murdered nine year old Elizabeth Olten. This teen killer who planned to kill more people would be arrested and sentenced to life in prison
Alyssa Bustamante – Teen Thrill Killer Alyssa Bustamante Could Get Paroled Some Day
A teenager who slit her young neighbor’s throat and called it “enjoyable” may have the opportunity to walk free one day.
Alyssa Bustamante, 18, was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole in a Missouri courtroom today.
The teen expressed remorse for brutally killing her neighbor, Elizabeth Olten, in October 2009, in what prosecutors described as a thrill killing.
“I know words can never be enough and they can never adequately describe how horribly I feel for all of this,” Bustamante said to Olten’s mother and siblings, who sat silently. “If I could give my life to get her back I would. I’m sorry.”
Bustamante stabbed the 9-year-old girl in the chest, strangled her, sliced her throat and left her in a shallow grave covered with leaves so she could find out what it felt like to kill.
“I just f***ing killed someone. I strangled them and slit their throat and stabbed them now they’re dead. I don’t know how to feel atm [at the moment],” Bustamante wrote in her diary.
She later added: “It was ahmazing. As soon as you get over the ‘ohmygawd I can’t do this’ feeling, it’s pretty enjoyable. I’m kinda nervous and shaky though right now. Kay, I gotta go to church now…lol.”
Elizabeth’s mother, Patty Preiss called Bustamante “an evil monster” and said that she “hated her” on the first day of the teen’s sentencing hearing.
Prosecutor Mark Richardson had argued for life in prison, plus 71 years, accounting for the years Elizabeth lost.
“These sentences are appropriate and fit what happened to Elizabeth at the hands of a truly evil individual who strangled and stabbed an innocent child simply for the thrill of it,” Richardson said in a statement.
The defense cited Bustamante’s depression and a suicide attempt as a reason for a reduced sentence.
On the teen’s YouTube page, a video appears to show the suspect with her brothers purposefully shocking themselves on an electrified fence. She listed “killing people” as one of her hobbies under her profile.
Her Twitter messages around the time of the murder spoke of “addiction” and “terrors.”
One message said, “all I want in life is a reason for all this pain.”
“She committed the murder after deliberation, which means cool deliberation or cool reflection on the matter for any length of time,” Cole County prosecutor Mark Richardson told the court Wednesday.
Alyssa Bustamante – Bustamante appeals life sentence for killing 9-year-old neighbor girl
Convicted child killer Alyssa Bustamante just turned 20 years old Jan. 28 and is now nearly four years into a life sentence with the possibility of parole. She is appealing her sentence.
Bustamante was sentenced in 2012 for what prosecutors called the thrill kill of a 9-year-old neighbor girl, Elizabeth Olten in October 2009. She testified in Cole Co. Court today that when she accepted the plea agreement, she did not fully understand the current state of the law on sentencing juveniles as an adult, and would have possibly put her fate in the hands of a jury instead.
“The threat of (life without parole) as a mandatory sentence was allowed to intimidate Alyssa into accepting a guilty plea she would not have otherwise accepted,” Attorney Gary Brotherton wrote in documents filed with the Cole County Circuit Court claiming Bustamante had ineffective counsel at the time she pleaded guilty.
Brotherton told the court that two cases could have had an effect on Bustamante’s options.
Miller v. Alabama was decided in 2012 — after Bustamante was sentenced — in which the United States Supreme Court held that mandatory sentences of life without the possibility of parole are unconstitutional for juvenile offenders. A previous case in 2010, Graham v. Florida, ruled that life without parole sentences for juvenile offenders is unconstitutional, barring murder.
Bustamante was charged as an adult with first-degree murder, which carries a mandatory sentence of life without the possibility of parole. She accepted an agreement with the prosecution that she would plead guilty to a reduced charge of murder in the second degree and armed criminal action. She was sentenced to 30 years with the possibility of parole for the murder charge, and 30 years for using a knife to kill her victim, which is ordered to run at the conclusion of her life sentence.
Brotherton asked Bustamante on the stand if she had spoken with her attorneys about legal issues.
“Yes,” she answered, “but I didn’t really understand legal issues.”
“At that time you had barely started the 10th grade?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Bustamante’s state-appointed attorneys, Don Catlett and Charles Moreland, had each testified that she had accepted the plea agreement less than an hour after it was offered. She told the court she felt pressured to make a decision, and that she just wanted to get it over with. “I didn’t really, couldn’t wrap my mind around it,” she said. “It was just … hopelessness.” She confirmed that she was being treated with medication for depression and anxiety at the time, and said while being held by the county, she slept a lot and continued cutting herself.
Judge Pat Joyce has given Brotherton 30 days to send her proposed orders. She’ll make a decision after that whether to declare Bustamante’s counsel was ineffective and order a new trial or let the current sentence stand.
Olten’s mother, Patty Preiss, was in the courtroom but declined to comment. Also present was Bustamante’s grandmother, Karen Brooke, who had custody of Alyssa when Olten was killed.
Bustamante admitted prior to her sentencing that she killed Olten by strangling her and slashing her throat. She then buried her in a shallow grave in a heavily wooded area near the girls’ homes. She had written in her diary that the experience was “ahmazing,” and later told investigators she had done it because she wanted to see what it was like to kill someone
Alyssa Bustamante – Alyssa Bustamante will remain in prison
A Missouri woman sentenced to life in prison when she was a juvenile for slaying a nine year-old girl will remain in prison.
Judge Patricia Joyce has denied Alyssa Bustamante’s motion to set aside and correct a judgement for a plea deal Bustamante accepted in 2012.
Bustamante was facing a first-degree murder charge for killing nine year-old Elizabeth Olten, but she plead guilty to second-degree murder in January 2012 and was sentenced to life with the chance of parole.
Bustamante testified in January that she wouldn’t have plead guilty if she had known about a pending U.S. Supreme Court case involving juvenile murder defendants.
After Bustamante was sentenced, the Supreme Court ruled that mandatory life prison sentences for juveniles were unconstitutional.
It remains unclear if Bustamante intends to appeal Judge Joyce’s ruling.
Alyssa Bustamante – efferson City woman reaches $5M settlement with inmate in killing of 9-year-old daughter
A Missouri woman whose 9-year-old daughter was killed by a teenage neighbor in 2009 has agreed to settle a wrongful death lawsuit that requires the imprisoned killer to pay her more than $5 million.
Patricia Preiss signed a deal Monday to settle the lawsuit she filed against Alyssa Bustamante, who was 15 when she killed Preiss’ daughter, Elizabeth. Prosecutors alleged Bustamante committed the crime to see how it felt to kill someone.
Bustamante, who is now 23, confessed to the killing. She was sentenced to life in prison after pleading guilty to second-degree murder.
It’s unclear if Bustamante has the means to pay the settlement. Attorneys for her and Priess did not immediately return phone calls seeking details Tuesday from The Associated Press.
Bustamante signed the settlement agreement in March, but documents show Preiss didn’t agree to the deal until Monday, The Jefferson City News-Tribune reported. A trial was scheduled to begin on Aug. 7. Bustamante is serving her sentence at the Women’s Eastern Missouri Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center in Vandalia.
Bustamante pleaded guilty in 2012 to luring Elizabeth to the woods in the small town of St. Martins, just west of Jefferson City. She slit the girl’s throat and strangled her before burying her in a grave she had dug several days in advance, according to investigators.
Under the lawsuit settlement, Preiss agreed to dismiss any remaining counts. Bustamante also is required to notify Preiss if she receives any compensation arising from publicity about the case.
Tristan Potts was thirteen years old when he murdered his twelve year old sister. According to court documents Tristan Potts and his sister Teresa Potts were both adopted out of the foster care system. On the day of the murder this teen killer would open fire on his sister than flee the home headed for the woods. Tristan would return sometime later and authorities believed he planned to set the house on fire before fleeing to Georgia.
Tristan Potts would plead guilty to second degree murder and be sentenced to twenty five years in prison however he is also in the Missouri State juvenile program so if he shows marked improvement he could be released when he turns twenty one
Tristan Potts Other News
A southwestern Missouri teenager has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for fatally shooting his 12-year-old sister when he was 13.
Tristan Potts, now 15, was sentenced Monday in Joplin for second-degree murder, armed criminal action and attempted first-degree arson, The Joplin Globe ) reports. Tristan, who was certified to stand trial as an adult, pleaded guilty to the charges in December.
His sister, Teresa Potts, was suffering from gunshot wounds to her temple and right shoulder when officers responded in October 2015 to their adoptive parents’ home near Jasper. Authorities say the siblings were adopted out of foster care.
Chris Carriger, a detective with the Jasper County Sheriff’s Department, testified at a hearing that Tristan fled into some woods after the shooting and turned up later near a shop building behind the house, close to where investigators eventually recovered two handguns. Carriger said the teen tested positive for gunshot residue on his hands.
The teen was believed to have been preparing to set the family’s home on fire and run off to Georgia. The detective said he found the home in “messy disarray,” with black gunpowder strewn throughout the rooms and about 500 rounds of .22-caliber bullets in two skillets in the kitchen.
Carriger also testified that the investigation turned up three lists that bore the fingerprints of Tristan Potts, including one titled “Supplies for Georgia.” Investigators later learned that the boy had been in contact on Facebook with a female in Georgia. Items on the to-do-lists, including a gun and food, were found near the home’s front door.
As part of the sentence, a judge assigned Potts to a program in which a juvenile and adult sentence is simultaneously imposed, with the adult sentence suspended while the inmate undergoes treatment and vocational training. When he turns 21, the court determines whether he should remain in custody.
Circuit Judge David Mouton sustained a motion Tuesday that would keep Tristan Potts in the state’s dual jurisdiction program for teens convicted of serious crimes past his 18th birthday two months from now.
Tristan Potts shot and killed his 12-year-old sister, Teresa Potts, in the front yard of their adoptive parents’ home on Oct. 8, 2015, when he was 13 years old. Investigators discovered evidence in the wake of the shooting that the youth was preparing to set the family’s home on fire as well and run off to Georgia to be with a girl he knew through Facebook.
The arson was prevented and his plan to run away thwarted when his father arrived home just as the fatal shots were fired.
The teen, who was certified to stand trial as an adult, pleaded guilty in December 2016 to second-degree murder, armed criminal action and arson, and was sentenced to concurrent terms of 25 years, 15 years and seven years.
Mouton decided at that time that the teen should serve the terms in the dual jurisdiction program of the Division of Youth Services in the Missouri Department of Social Services. Potts has been incarcerated since March 2017 in the program’s detention center at Montgomery City.
State law establishing and governing the program states that when juvenile offenders reach the age of 17, the court of conviction and sentencing must hold a hearing and revoke the suspension of sentence that led to their placement at Montgomery City and transfer them into the adult prison system for completion of their term when they turn 18, direct that they remain in the Montgomery City program or place them on probation.
Tristan Potts, who will turn 18 on Nov. 15, was at the hearing Tuesday in Jasper County Circuit Court in the custody of youth services personnel.
Amy Crites, an attorney for the Division of Youth Services, told Mouton that Potts “has done amazingly well” in the program. She said the division consequently was recommending he remain at Montgomery City past his 18th birthday. A motion to that effect was filed with the court Aug. 27.
A letter attached to the motion and signed by the manager and youth group leader at the Montgomery City Youth Center states that Potts completed his high school education while being held there and that he is enrolled in classes this fall offered through the Moberly Area Community College. The letter states that his ultimate education goal is to enroll in the equine program at William Woods University once he is released from state custody.
The letter states that he has demonstrated “overall progress” in meeting the treatment goals that were set for him when he first entered the program, which included a focus on developing empathy and using it in his decision-making, learning how to deal with feelings of abandonment, neglect and loss, and developing “healthy coping skills and self-regulation.”
“When Tristan arrived at Montgomery City Youth Center, he didn’t have an understanding of empathy,” the letter reads. “Tristan has put much work into learning to develop empathy for others and has demonstrated empathy with group members” and “continues to reflect on past experiences in regards to these issues, as well as the death of his sister; however, he has more work to do while he is here.”
The letter states that Tristan Potts has come to understand how his actions affected his victims and the community in which he lived.
And further reads: “Tristan tried to participate in family therapy with his family with the goal of making an amends; however, they are unable to attend because of the distance they have to travel. He has tried talking to family members about his past actions, but this has led to arguments as they are unable to effectively communicate at this time.”
Theresa Kenney, the Jasper County prosecutor, told the judge that her office is not opposed to the teen remaining in the program at Montgomery City past his 18th birthday.
A juvenile offender can remain at Montgomery City until his 21st birthday, prior to which time, a hearing must be held to determine if he is to be released on probation or transferred to an adult prison to continue serving his sentences.
The judge imposed three special conditions when he sent Potts to the program two years ago. He ordered that the youth must show a genuine commitment to participate in the program, accept any restrictions imposed on him and not pose a threat to the safety of others involved in the program.
“Tristan, I’ve been very glad to see your progress,” the judge told Potts at Tuesday’s hearing. “It’s good to see you today. You have exceeded my expectations.”
A 15-year-old boy in Missouri was sentenced to 25 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to the murder of his sister, according to news reports.
The Joplin Globe reports Circuit Judge David Mouton sentenced Tristan Potts to 25 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to shooting and killing his 12-year-old sister Teresa “Tressa” Potts. Tristan was reportedly 13 when he committed the crime.
In 2015, Tristan Potts reportedly shot his sister in the head and shoulder in the front yard of their adoptive parents’ home and then fled into the woods. The Joplin Globe reports he may have been planning to set the home on fire and go to Georgia, where a girl he had apparently been in touch with lives. Investigators found gunpowder residue throughout the home, along with around 500 bullets, the New York Daily News reported. The Joplin Globe also reported that two .22-caliber handguns had been taken from his father’s gun cabinet; Teresa was shot with a .22-caliber gun, according to autopsy results.
In a plea deal, Tristan pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, armed criminal action and attempted arson, according to the New York Daily News. The judge sentenced him to 25 years in prison for the murder, along with 15 years for armed criminal action and seven years for attempted arson. Tristan will be able to serve the 15- and 7-year sentences concurrently with his 25-year term. But, his actual stay in prison may be shorter than that; he was also placed in a program that provides treatment, education, and jobs training up until age 21. Once Tristan turns 21, the court will reassess whether they think he should remain in prison, according to the New York Daily News.
Levi Elliott was fifteen years old when he fatally shot his twelve year old stepsister. According to court documents Levi Elliott would fatally shoot Sierra Elliott while his father and stepmother were out of town. Levi would leave the home and hitchhike to where his mother lived. Upon arrival she brought him to a police station to turn her son in. According to Levi Elliott someone broke into their home and shot his stepsister. However this teen killer would be convicted of murder and sentenced to thirty years in prison.
Levi Elliott 2023 Information
DOC ID1277847
Offender Name Levi S Elliott
RaceWhite
SexMale
Date of Birth02/10/1997
Height/Weight6’0″ / 165
Hair/EyesBlonde/Strawberry / Blue
Assigned Location Jefferson City Correctional Center
Sentence Summary30 Years (20, 5, 5 CS)
Active OffensesMURDER 2ND DEGREE; ARMED CRIMINAL ACTION; TAMPER WITH MOTOR VEH-1ST DEG
AliasesLevi Scott Adams (LEGAL NAME); Levi Elliott; Levi S Elliott; Levi Scott Elliott
Levi Elliott Other News
Levi Elliott who was 15 when he was accused of killing his younger stepsister has been convicted of second-degree murder.
KYTV reports a jury returned the verdict against 17-year-old Levi Elliott on Wednesday afternoon following a trial that began Monday. He was also convicted of armed criminal action and tampering with a vehicle.
Investigators said Levi Elliott shot 12-year-old Sierra Elliott at their Polk County home west of Bolivar in March 2012 while his father and stepmother were away. He then drove to Clinton and got a ride to Kansas City, where his mother took him to a police station.
Levi Elliott was tried as an adult in Benton County, where the trial was moved because of publicity about the case in Polk County. Sentencing is set for Dec. 19
Levi Elliott More News
It hits Joy Adams at some point every day.
Sometimes when she first wakes up, sometimes when she sees pictures of her son’s friends and sometimes when she runs into people she hasn’t seen for awhile and they casually ask: How’s Levi doing?
“It’s surreal, even after all this time,” Adams said. “There is still, every day, some point where it just hits me again. It is like a tidal wave. You think this can’t really be happening, this can’t really be our life.”
Adams’ son Levi Elliott is in prison.
He was convicted by a jury in October of fatally shooting his 12-year-old half-sister, Sierra, in rural Polk County.
Levi Elliott — now 18 — was 15 at the time of Sierra’s killing. He was tried as an adult and sentenced in January to spend the next 30 years in prison.
Adams left the courthouse in an ambulance after the verdict was returned in her son’s case. She said hearing “guilty” from the jury foreperson left her in a “catatonic state.”
Adams was almost equally shocked a few months later when a judge handed down the 30-year sentence.
“I was speechless,” Adams said. “My son has absolutely no criminal past… We didn’t see that sentence coming.”
Levi’s lawyer, Robert Calbi, said he was expecting a sentence more in the the 15-year range.
Once Adams started to come to terms with the verdict and the sentence, that initial shock was replaced with an intense drive to clear her son’s name.
“It’s fight mode,” Adams said. “I will spend every day of the rest of my life fighting for my son’s innocence.”
Adams was at a karaoke bar with friends on the night of March 24, 2012, when suddenly a warm feeling came over her body and a voice in her head told her to check her phone.
She looked down and saw that she had a dozen missed calls from Peggy Elliott — Sierra’s mother.
“I stepped outside and I called her,” Adams said. “I could not understand what she was saying. She was just — of course — sobbing, incoherent. And I kept saying ‘Peggy, I don’t understand what you are saying to me.’ And she was screaming ‘You do understand, your son shot my daughter in the head, and now she’s dead.’
“And that was the moment that our lives changed.”
Since she picked Levi up in Clinton that night three years ago and heard his account of the shooting, Adams has never wavered in her belief that her son is innocent. The jury’s verdict in October did nothing to sway a mother’s trust.
Levi Elliott’s version of the story goes like this:
•Levi and Sierra were home alone at their father’s house in rural Polk County on March 24, 2012 when an intruder came inside and shot Sierra.
•Levi got in his father’s truck and drove away, toward his mother’s house in Kansas City, as the intruder followed him.
•The intruder eventually changed routes, and Levi — low on gas by then — stopped in Clinton and called his mom to come pick him up.
Prosecutors argued that Levi shot Sierra and then fled the scene in his dad’s truck. The jury agreed.
Peggy Elliott has testified that although Sierra was unable to speak after the shooting, she was able to answer a question about whether Levi shot her by raising her hand to indicate a “yes” answer.
A small-caliber bullet was recovered from the girl’s head and was consistent with the bullets located inside the residence, a probable cause statement says.
Adams brought Levi to the police station in Kansas City that night back in 2012, and she said everything that happened next has left her disillusioned with the criminal justice system.
“It has completely changed the way that I see our police force, our judicial system, the courts,” Adams said. “It took the trust that I once had, and it shattered it.”
Adams said she and her lawyer are working toward appealing the verdict in Levi’s case. For now, however, she is trying to make the most of a tough situation
When Levi was first transported to prison after the trial, he was taken to Farmington Correctional Center, south of St. Louis.
Adams would make the five-hour drive to see her son every Saturday. And they would visit for a couple of hours as Levi sat in a caged room.
“I put on a face while I am in there,” Adams said. “And then I cry when I leave.”
About two months ago, Levi was transferred to Crossroads Correctional Center in Cameron — about an hour away from Adams’ home in northern Kansas City.
Now Adams can have four-hour “contact” visits with her son every Saturday where they talk and play cards. She said he is in a better situation, but it still breaks her heart to see him in jail.
Adams said Levi is stoic during their visits and he does his best to shield her from any negative emotions.
But she worries.
Adams said she feels guilty going out to eat or doing something fun out of fear that Levi will feel like he is being forgotten.
Levi’s case consumes Adams, but for a long time she had a place to go during the day to get away from the legal troubles. Adams said she kept her personal struggles separate from her work at a doctor’s office in Kansas City for as long as she could, but eventually co-workers started seeing her son’s mugshot on the news.
Adams said one day she called a meeting before work and spilled everything to her co-workers.
“I just really didn’t want to delve into it,” Adams said. “I think more than anything I didn’t want pity. I didn’t want people to look at me and treat me differently than they had for 10 years.”
Adams said her only goal now is to make sure her son has a future.
“If I can’t get this turned around, he will never have a wife, he will never have children, he will never know the love that we are intended to know,” Adams said. “It breaks my heart.”
Adams said her heart also breaks for Sierra, and she can’t imagine how tough the past three years have been on her ex-husband James and his wife Peggy — Sierra’s parents.
Adams said Sierra’s death and Levi’s conviction have shaken her faith in God, and split her family
Prior to the shooting, Adams had virtually no relationship with her daughter, Ashley Elliott.
Over the past three years, however, Adams and Ashley have grown closer. Adams frequently helps care for Ashley’s young daughter.
Ashley — who also believes Levi is innocent — said she now has no contact with her father or anyone on that side of her family.
“The first time I got the call, it was ‘Your sister has been shot, your brother is missing,'”Ashley said. “I thought it was a joke… It was very surreal. It was like your entire world stops in five minutes and everything around you keeps moving.”
Ashley said she has gone to visit Levi frequently over the last few months, and he beams when he gets to hold his niece. Ashley just wishes Levi got to be an uncle for more than four hours per week.
Adams said even after 18 years and a murder trial, she still sees Levi as a kid.
She said she can barely breathe — when that moment hits her each day and she realizes her son is facing 30 years in prison.
Levi’s lawyer said he is in contact with Adams on a regular basis and he has been impressed with her drive.
“She is a mom that believes her child has been wronged and is doing everything in her power to see that changed,” Calbi said. “Her resolve has been as strong today as when this whole thing started.”
Adams said she would switch places with Levi in a heartbeat. But for now all she can do is fight for her son.
“He is my youngest,” Adams said. “He has always been my baby.”
Levi Elliott is currently incarcerated at the Jefferson City Correctional Center
Levi Elliott Release Date
Levi Elliott is scheduled for release in 2044
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