Joseph E. Duncan III
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| Joseph E. Duncan III | |
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| Born | February 25, 1963 Tacoma, Washington |
| Charge(s) | murder, kidnapping |
| Penalty | not yet sentenced |
| Status | pending federal trial |
| Occupation | unknown? |
Joseph Edward Duncan III (born February 25, 1963) is an alleged American serial killer, and convicted sex offender and murderer who received national attention after being arrested in connection with the kidnapping of Shasta Groene, age eight, and her brother Dylan, age nine.
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[edit] Early criminal history
Duncan has a long history as a violent sexual predator, and was clinically diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder in 1980, while in prison for raping a younger boy at knifepoint.
In 2004, Duncan groped the genitals of a 7-year-old boy. He was arrested in April 2005 in Minnesota. The judge granted bail at $15,000. A businessman in Fargo, Joe Crary, gave Duncan money for bail.[1] While thus freed Duncan jumped bail.
[edit] Shasta and Dylan
Idaho police are sure Duncan was also involved in the May 2005 murders of Dylan and Shasta's family: Brenda Groene, 40, Slade Groene, 13, and Mark McKenzie, 37. According to Shasta's police interview, an intruder tied her family members up, and then she and her brother were taken into a 2000 Jeep Cherokee.
A camera in a convenience store, approximately 40 miles outside of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, recorded Shasta wandering the aisles while Duncan read a newspaper. Later on, in the early morning hours of July 2, 2005, Shasta was found in Duncan's custody. The two had entered a Denny's restaurant in Coeur d'Alene. A waitress recognized Shasta from media reports, as well as posters that had been posted around town and in the restaurant. The waitress, Amber Deahn, worked with her manager to delay the suspect and contact local police. Deahn stalled the order until the police arrived and made a positive ID on the stolen rental car, which also displayed stolen Missouri state license plates.
Police later entered the restaurant and arrested Duncan, removing Shasta to a local hospital for observation and care. The waitress asked Shasta, "Where is your brother?" Shasta replied, "My brother is in heaven."
Shasta told investigators her mother called her into the living room, from her bedroom where she had been sleeping, and she saw Duncan wearing black gloves and holding a gun. Her captor tied her mother's hands with nylon zip ties, and did the same to her mother's boyfriend and an older brother. Dylan and Shasta were removed from the house and placed inside the stolen rental car. While she waited with her brother, she heard her mother's boyfriend scream out and then saw her injured older brother staggering away from the entrance to the home. Both Shasta and Dylan were removed to other locations, where they were repeatedly raped and molested for six weeks. She said that they drove long distances and had stayed in various campgrounds, while Duncan bragged of having beaten family members to death with a hammer.
Dylan's remains were found in a remote, woodland area in Montana days after Shasta was rescued. Shasta is now in the custody of her biological father.
Duncan appeared in court on July 6, 2005, during his araignment on two counts of first-degree kidnapping. His trial was set to begin on January 17, 2006, but was delayed until April 4, after the district judge granted a request to the defense for more time to prepare for the trial, and then again to October 26, after 1st District Judge Fred Gibler stated that "No one wants to try this case twice, including me", thus granting Duncan's attorneys the six month extension. On October 16, 2006, Duncan plead guilty to three counts of first-degree murder and three counts of kidnapping for the deaths of Brenda, Slade, and Mark. In an agreement reached with prosecutors, Duncan, 43, will receive three consecutive life sentences on the kidnapping charges, which stem from the manner in which Duncan detained the victims before their deaths. His sentencing on the murder charges has been delayed until the completion of his case in federal court for crimes that allegedly occurred against Shasta and Dylan Groene after they were kidnapped from the family's home. [2]
In a January 23, 2007 interview, Duncan admitted to killing three other children in the Wisconsin area. Detectives are checking into this new information.
[edit] "The Fifth Nail" and "Fifth Nail Revelations"
Duncan recorded many of his violent sexual fantasies, even to the extent of becoming a sex offender advocate working for the repeal of sex offender law. He published his ideas on the Internet. He titled it "Fifth Nail", which is also the URL for his personal website. According to lore, in addition to the four nails used to pierce the body of Jesus Christ as he was hung upon the cross, there was a fifth nail that was taken away and hid by Gypsies. Duncan adopted the name for his own website and blog. The website depicted Duncan's day to day life as a sex offender. Together with his many years of incarceration, Duncan expressed his feelings of persecution.
Investigators are also considering the possibility that a "Minnesota girl" mentioned in his online diary could be related to another minor who is listed as missing. Duncan can receive the death penalty.
"The Fifth Nail" advocates for sex offenders and contained material that called for the legal reform law aimed at sex offenders, calling them, "State Sanctioned Discrimination." Duncan was particularly angered by the requirement for sex offenders to participate in a public registry. Criminologists and psychiatric researchers are studying the blog to better understand the mind and behaviors of a sociopath.
With the help of a "ghost blogger", Duncan has been posting to his new blog "Fifth Nail Revelations", from prison. He writes his blog entries by hand and mails them to the "ghost blogger", who posts them exactly as written. According to media reports, law enforcement agencies have been watching the contents of the new blog in hopes of gathering incriminating information about Duncan's crimes, both known and unknown.
[edit] Cold case
In August 2005, California cold case investigators connected a single fingerprint to Duncan in an unsolved homicide. The case, cold since 1997, is the murder of 10-year-old Anthony Michael Martinez, a resident of Beaumont, California. Anthony was abducted April 4, 1997 right in front of his friends after an unknown male approached them with an offer of one dollar, if they help him find his missing cat. The boys refused the offer, but the stranger grabbed Anthony by the collar, placed a knife near his throat, and threw him into a white vehicle. Anthony's nude body was found April 19 near Indio, California. His hands were bound with duct tape, where the killer left his fingerprint. Duncan is believed to have been in the southern California region around April 1997. It is unknown when Duncan will be formally charged. [3] If charged and convicted he may face a life sentence in Federal Supermax Prison in Florence, Colorado.
