In November, someone phoned 911 in the Ft. Worth, Texas, area, said nothing and hung up. The dispatcher traced the number and called back. When a woman answered, the operator asked what the problem was. “I’m afraid my husband and I are bad parents,” said Linda Hill, according to police. “We haven’t been feeding our child. "
When the police arrived at the Hills’ trailer in White Settlement, Texas, they found a comatose 13-year-old boy chained to a kitchen cabinet. Stephen Hill weighed only 55 pounds, and looked, in the words of one officer, like “a concentration-camp survivor.” But Stephen was not a survivor; without regaining consciousness, he died in the hospital 13 days later.
Why was Stephen starved to death? Police say Jay Hill told them he disciplined his son by withholding food when “the hitting wasn’t working any longer.” Poverty is not an issue for the family: Hill is a college-educated engineer employed by General Dynamics, and both parents, quite overweight, are obviously well fed. The Hills have pleaded not guilty to charges of aggravated kidnapping and injury to a child, which carry a maximum life sentence. Stephen’s brother, Douglas, 12, who police say was periodically denied food and has been placed in foster care-could become the prosecution’s star witness.
To police, it looked like a tragic case of arson. In late November, Kim Lawrence’s new apartment caught fire. The single mother and her 7-year-old son escaped, but daughter Tyesha, 6, and son Taiwan, 4, were trapped inside. When firefighters got to the Atlanta apartment complex, Taiwan was dead, but Tyesha, who survived, was rushed to the hospital.
Later, doctors made some surprising discoveries: both children had stab wounds in their backs. And since Taiwan had no smoke in his lungs, he probably died before the fire reached the bedroom. Police constructed a disturbing scenario: the oldest boy, whose name is being withheld, stabbed his siblings after a fight over who would sleep in a bunk bed. Police believe Lawrence, 26, woke up and found her youngest children in pools of blood. She thought they were dead or dying, and allegedly set the fire to cover up for her oldest son. Lawrence admits torching her sofa-she says she wanted to trigger the smoke alarm to alert rescuers, rather than phone 911 herself. But hearing Tyesha’s cries, she rang 911 and fled the apartment with her oldest son.
Police charged Lawrence with arson, attempting to conceal a death and aggravated battery. Claiming Taiwan might have survived if his mother had phoned 911 immediately rather than set the fire, they added a felony murder count. But that still leaves Atlanta police with an unprecedented problem: what to do about a 7-year-old murder suspect.
According to her husband, Dallas accountant Rhonda Hamilton, 34, ran out to buy doughnuts on Sept. 22 and never came back. A worried Timothy Hamilton was shown on local television organizing search parties. Eventually, investigators found Rhonda’s car abandoned on a street near her home. Her body turned up later-in her closet. Hamilton pleaded guilty in December to suffocating his wife with a pillow, and the judge handed down a 40-year sentence. What baffles police most is the apparent motive. They believe Hamilton, also an accountant, was envious of his wife’s flourishing career.
During telephone surveillance of a drug ring in Rockaway, N.J., cops learned that a Roman Catholic priest occasionally bought cocaine. Last Thanksgiving week, Father Patrick Hurley, 51, helped police stage a drug raid on the ring’s headquarters. Released on bond, Hurley has entered a rehabilitation program and is negotiating a plea bargain. His parishioners were stunned, but in the spirit of the season, they are forgiving. “He is a well-loved man,” says his lawyer, John Montefusco. “The people all want him back.”
