UNION CITY Fugitive's 33 years on the run come to end in girlfriend's closet Marisa Lagos, Chronicle Staff Writer Thursday, February 22, 2007
A man who escaped from a New Jersey prison nearly 33 years ago was found hiding in a closet at his girlfriend's Union City apartment Tuesday after federal and state officials followed his trail through four states.
James Quisenberry, now 59, was serving time for aggravated assault with intent to kill and armed robbery when he escaped from state prison on June 6, 1974, said U.S. Marshals Service spokesman Michael Schroeder. Authorities believe that since his escape, Quisenberry has adopted as many as eight aliases and false identities and lived in Kentucky, Nevada and California.
When Quisenberry was found Tuesday afternoon, he was coy at first, Schroeder said.
"Finally the officer came out and said, 'I think you know why we're here,' " Schroeder said. "There was a pause, then Quisenberry said, 'Well, I've got a pretty good idea.' "
The case was reopened in 2004, after the Marshals Service was directed to create regional task forces across the United States in an attempt to track down state and local fugitives. The task forces include members of law enforcement agencies in the areas where they are based, Schroeder said.
In this case, a marshal partnered with a New Jersey Department of Corrections investigator who dug out Quisenberry's case, he said.
"He literally blew off the dust," Schroeder said. "They started going over a lot of the stuff investigated in the past and some new things. They found out four months ago that his mother had passed away in Louisville, Ky., in 2000, then they looked into it more and found out that he himself was named as one of the remaining sons, the next of kin."
Excited to find that Quisenberry was still alive, the investigators trooped down to Louisville, where they found that he had been arrested several times under several different aliases. Local officials never put two and two together, Schroeder said, because the crimes were minor and nonviolent, and Quisenberry would always skip out on bail before his fingerprints came back.
"From the arrests, we found more aliases and more identifiers, which led investigators to more minor arrests in Las Vegas, including one for credit card fraud," he said. "They come to find out that he had about eight aliases and one was the name Ewel Daniels."
The real Daniels lived in San Antonio, Schroeder said, but Quisenberry was using the name in California, where he had secured a state driver's license using the alias. While the fugitive had been evicted from his most recent address, investigators soon found out that he had a girlfriend, Mattie Riggs, who also went by Mattie Daniels.
At the investigators' request, marshals based in Oakland went by Riggs' Union City address and found her car, a 1992 Buick, parked outside with a for-sale sign on it, Schroeder said.
The two investigators flew out from New Jersey and, from Riggs' apartment complex parking lot, one of them called Riggs and posed as a potential buyer. When she hung up suddenly, they knocked on her door and later found Quisenberry hiding behind some clothes in a closet.
Quisenberry is now being held by Alameda County while he awaits an extradition hearing, Schroeder said. No charges have been filed against him or Riggs in connection with the identity theft, Schroeder added.
Schroeder did not have information on Quisenberry's original crime or the length of his prison term, but said the New Jersey Department of Corrections -- which was a different agency at the time of Quisenberry's escape -- is combing its archives to determine his criminal history.
Cynthia Sommer, 33, is shown in court, Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2007, in San Diego, Calif. Sommer, a Florida woman accused of poisoning her Marine husband with arsenic to cash in on his $250,000 life insurance policy, was convicted of murder on Tuesday. (AP Photo/ K.C. Alfred, Pool) AP via Yahoo! News - Jan 30 1:36 PM
Man Sentenced To 10 Years In Prison For Beating Death Of Daughter December 14, 2006
A Queens man is going to prison for ten years after beating his 7-year-old daughter to death last year.
Russell Roberts pleaded guilty to manslaughter for beating Sierra Roberts for two straight nights in October of 2005. Russell then waited two days to call 911 even though Sierra was obviously in pain.
She later died at the hospital.
An autopsy showed Sierra suffered blunt trauma to the torso, a laceration to the small intestine and fractured ribs.
(CBS/AP) RIVERHEAD, N.Y. A young man who nearly beheaded his stepfather with a samurai sword last year was convicted Wednesday of second-degree murder after jurors rejected his claim that his mother committed the brutal slaying.
The verdict capped a trial that included lurid testimony from Zachary Gibian alleging that his stepfather had sexually abused him since age 15 and that his mother flew into a murderous rage after finding out. Gibian's testimony contradicted the written and videotaped confessions that he made to police.
The jury, which deliberated over seven days, twice sent out notes that it was deadlocked this week before finally reaching a decision. The second note came just four hours before the guilty verdict in the Feb. 27, 2005, killing of Scott Nager, a retired New York City police officer slain as he slept on his living room couch.
Gibian, 20, closed his eyes and grimaced slightly as the guilty verdict was read. He then sat down at the defense table and began weeping uncontrollably. Nearby, Nager's father and sister hugged as tears streamed down their faces
"I didn't win anything by him being convicted," said Nathan Nager, 82, who treated Gibian as a grandson for years. "It's an empty thing, because I still don't have my son back. It's a no-win situation for me."
Gibian faces a maximum of 25 years to life in prison at his Jan. 10 sentencing. Defense attorney William Keahon, who said jurors told him the panel was initially split 6-6, promised an appeal.
"They should have been dismissed as jurors," Keahon said of the jurors' first note indicating they were deadlocked. "There should have been a mistrial."
Juror Gerard Whelan, who said he was the lone holdout for an acquittal, said he ultimately decided to vote for a conviction after watching Gibian's videotaped confession for a fourth time on Wednesday; it was shown once during the trial, and the jury asked for it to be replayed three times during deliberations.
"The video was it," he said. "It was so believable."
Prosecutors contended that Nager, 51, was not a sexual predator but a concerned parent trying to rein in a rebellious teenager.
"He is the one who committed this murder," Suffolk County Assistant District Attorney John Scott Prudenti said of Gibian during closing arguments. "All the evidence points to it, all the witnesses point to it."
Gibian, the lone defense witness, made stunning allegations that Nager had sexually and psychologically abused him for years. He claimed that numerous times, beginning when he was about 15, Nager would get drunk and repeatedly force his stepson to perform a sex act on him -- sometimes with a pistol against the boy's head.
He testified that his mother learned of the abuse the night before the killing, when she walked in on her husband and son in the boy's bedroom. Gibian also said on cross-examination that there would be no forensic evidence of the attacks because his stepfather always used a condom.
Prudenti called Gibian's allegations "preposterous."
The key prosecution witness was Gibian's friend Troy "T.J." Harrelson, the son of former New York Mets star and manager Bud Harrelson. He testified that Gibian called him for a ride to ditch evidence from the slaying and admitted the slaying to him.
Harrelson cut a deal with prosecutors and will plead guilty to hindering prosecution.
Gibian's clothing, which was part of the dumped evidence, had no blood on it. The prosecution said that was because of the angle of the sword when Nager was fatally injured.
Gibian testified that after arriving at his Hauppauge home to discover his slain stepfather, he decided to dump the samurai sword and admit to the crime to protect his mother, Laura Nager.
His mother, through her attorney, has insisted she was not the killer. She did not attend a day of her son's trial, and was never charged with any crime -- although investigators plan to examine the case against her in the coming days, said John Collins, chief of the Suffolk County district attorney's office homicide unit.
"We are not finished," Collins said of the investigation.
Gibian said he gave written and videotaped confessions after detectives told him that he would likely serve a prison term of five to seven years if he admitted the killing and saved his mother from prosecution.
There is no evidence police made such a promise. In the confessions, Gibian said he killed his stepfather to end years of verbal abuse by the man.
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