You're Sam's criminal defense attorney--DEFEND HIM

I wonder about that.

I think I would only classify Sam as immature and not child-like. No question that he had a crappy childhood and a crappy mother, however, it's never an excuse to take a life, let alone 4.

I can see a slight possibility that he could get a 2nd degree or voluntary manslaughter on maybe Emma or Debra, but that's only 1 out of 4.

Here's the obstacle: Sam's psych eval. may contain some valuable information, but there will be a state's expert to dispute that and take the opposite position. Then say you have jury members who've had a crappy childhood too, but are responsible members of society (albiet not smart enought to evade jury duty) and they are not going to sympathize with Sam or believe the defense expert.

I'm still waiting for that "something that is missing" to see what other options Bowen has than to plead

ziggy wrote:I think I would only classify Sam as immature and not child-like. No question that he had a crappy childhood and a crappy mother, however, it's never an excuse to take a life, let alone 4.

I can see a slight possibility that he could get a 2nd degree or voluntary manslaughter on maybe Emma or Debra, but that's only 1 out of 4.

Here's the obstacle: Sam's psych eval. may contain some valuable information, but there will be a state's expert to dispute that and take the opposite position. Then say you have jury members who've had a crappy childhood too, but are responsible members of society (albiet not smart enought to evade jury duty) and they are not going to sympathize with Sam or believe the defense expert.

I'm still waiting for that "something that is missing" to see what other options Bowen has than to plead

I could see him getting second degree on Emma, Mel, and the mother, depending on how it went down. Mark, though, seems to be premeditated. This would likely save his life.

dangrsmind wrote:I wonder about that.

Well, it's the same argument regardless. Did he commit the actus reas and did he have the requisite mens rea for each murder to be premeditated.

The problem is - how are we going to know how it went down in a way that helps mitigate the charges unless Sam talks?

How it went down - recreating it won't necessarily help us with determining mens rea or lack thereof. As the defense attorney how do you do this without risking putting your client on the stand?

It only takes on premeditated murder charge for him to get the death penalty.

dangrsmind wrote:It only takes on premeditated murder charge for him to get the death penalty.

I'm not so sure of that in Virginia: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I'm not sure I completely understand this, but that's why I thought his charges were dpme the way they are. He is charged with every possible pairing, plus stealing Mark's car. I think they have to get him on two things, so they are covering all of their bases. Am I misunderstanding that?

Thanks for that link. I think this may be why he is charged with stealing the pastor's car.

"4. The willful, deliberate, and premeditated killing of any person in the commission of robbery or attempted robbery;"

4. The willful, deliberate, and premeditated killing of any person in the
commission of robbery or attempted robbery;

8. The willful, deliberate, and premeditated killing of more than one
person within a three-year period;

In many states premeditated murder alone is not enough for a capital punishment charge, there must be another exacerbating factor such as robbery et. al.


They have him on those two for sure, I see no reason to assume the State will not ask for the DP and likely get it.

AndresEscobar wrote:

dangrsmind wrote:I wonder about that.

Well, it's the same argument regardless. Did he commit the actus reas and did he have the requisite mens rea for each murder to be premeditated.

I love it when you talk dirty.

BUTT WAIT! Isn't the charge Grand Larceny of a Motor Vehicle? It says in the indictment it's a class U felony...whatever that means. Could that amount to being as dangerous as robbery and an exacerbating factor in the Commonwealth of VA?
see indictments here:
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

I believe "U" stands for unclassified. It does on some police reports at any rate.

dangrsmind wrote:I believe "U" stands for unclassified. It does on some police reports at any rate.

Yes, in Virginia it means unclassified. The punishments don't follow the normal numbered classes. I don't know the impact of this on Sam though.

Regardless I think it's highly unlikely he will get a jury to reduce a 1st degree murder charge in all three of the homicides that include Mel, Debra and Emma. That's what it would take to disqualify the DP right?

ziggy wrote:BUTT WAIT! Isn't the charge Grand Larceny of a Motor Vehicle? It says in the indictment it's a class U felony...whatever that means. Could that amount to being as dangerous as robbery and an exacerbating factor in the Commonwealth of VA?
see indictments here:
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Not all states have this requirement so I am not as familiar with it as I would like to be to comment with any authority. But this is my limited understanding of it. If you commit a murder, premeditated or not, you could always argue that it was in a fit of rage which would not constitute a capital murder charge so in order to avoid this problem VA requires another exacerbating facor in addition to the murder to prove that the accused had the requisite mens rea (frame of mind) when he committed the murder. That is to say if you murdered someone AND were also committing robbery at the same time you cant argue it was a fit of rage because the robbery shows you were in a criminal mental/mindset (mens rea) to begin with. In short, you were there to commit a crime to begin with.

Talk to me about Syniister or howeveryouspellit's testimony. If what Sam said to him was a confession, isn't that going to come into evidence? He will certainly be a witness. He was the first one to know of the homicides at the residence and alerted authorities right?

ziggy wrote:Talk to me about Syniister or howeveryouspellit's testimony. If what Sam said to him was a confession, isn't that going to come into evidence? He will certainly be a witness. He was the first one to know of the homicides at the residence and alerted authorities right?

He was the first to know as far as we know, I am now wondering if Sam may have sent pics even before he called Syn, Syn did not call the cops as far as I understand, he called Shrim and then Shrim called the cops,which puts Syn in a difficult situation where they can squeeze him and force him to testify against Sam being that he called a friend first before the authorities after learning a murder took place.


All I know is that Sam said to Syn "I killed them all and I am in big trouble" There is also speculation now that he told Syn what took place would be very good for Wicked Intent Record promotion, since Sam had been working for WIR at the time as a promoter and Syn was the owner of WIR.

Yes thanks for clarifying that - Somebody - we are now assuming it was Syn called Raz - who told Shirm who called the cops. Man that's the one good thing ole' Andy Shirm did huh?

So you might get "Jesus told me to do it" barred from evidence, but there may be another confession out there in the testimony of Syn.

ziggy wrote:Yes thanks for clarifying that - Somebody - we are now assuming it was Syn called Raz - who told Shirm who called the cops. Man that's the one good thing ole' Andy Shirm did huh?

So you might get "Jesus told me to do it" barred from evidence, but there may be another confession out there in the testimony of Syn.

Yes and Syn is in a bad position because whether he intended it or not they could have charged him with covering up a murder, obstruction of justice etc for not calling the LE immediately and instead calling a friend first. So they will squeeze him like a puppet and get whatever they want out of him on the stand. I want to be there to see that.

Is it possible that Syn did NOT know that all were considered missing? I find it hard to believe that considering the massive communications between all the players via the internet.

The only defense he could have is that he didn't believe Sam and was not aware that there was concern about the inability to contact Emma, Mel etc. So he called Raz at which time she told him they were all missing and then he realized what had just happened. Still weak.

ziggy wrote:Is it possible that Syn did NOT know that all were considered missing? I find it hard to believe that considering the massive communications between all the players via the internet.

The only defense he could have is that he didn't believe Sam and was not aware that there was concern about the inability to contact Emma, Mel etc. So he called Raz at which time she told him they were all missing and then he realized what had just happened. Still weak.

He COULD argue that but I am certain he knew, it seems that this info that they were missing was all over the horrorcore community within hours of it becoming known by whomever first knew and Syn is a big player in that community AND SAMS BEST FRIEND so IN FACT he MAY HAVE BEEN THE FIRST TO KNOW they were missing since he likely would have been in contact with Sam any number of times a day as most friends are.

ziggy wrote:The problem is - how are we going to know how it went down in a way that helps mitigate the charges unless Sam talks?

How it went down - recreating it won't necessarily help us with determining mens rea or lack thereof. As the defense attorney how do you do this without risking putting your client on the stand?

Forensic analysis could recreate what happened with some accuracy*. Blood splatter, decomp, flies, stomach contents, etc.

* One would make this argument when it helps your case. When the forensic analysis hurts your case, you hammer home the criticism that forensic analysis isn't as reliable as people are lead to believe.

ziggy wrote:Yes thanks for clarifying that - Somebody - we are now assuming it was Syn called Raz - who told Shirm who called the cops. Man that's the one good thing ole' Andy Shirm did huh?

So you might get "Jesus told me to do it" barred from evidence, but there may be another confession out there in the testimony of Syn.

You might colloquially refer to what Sam said to Syn as a "confession" but it's very different from an actual confession to the police. Syn would be a witness. If you wanted to dispute what Syn said, do you think it would be that hard to impeach him as a witness?

ETA: since we don't really know what Sam said to syn, it's pretty hard to speculate about his testimony and what would come in, etc.

Well first I'll address that just because you can recreate what happened forensically - you can't mitigate Sam's charges in those killings unless you negate the requisite mens rea...so while it will help to established what happened, it may not give the "why" and therefore without that - Sam can go down for 1st degree murder. You've been saying that the three women may have been a crime of passion or some other mitigating circumstance, but how will that come to light without it coming from Sam? That was the crux of my question.

(What do we call it...the admission instead of the confession? Since we don't have an actual police confession, I was referring to it as such. )
Next - Syn could be impeached as a witness, but he has some things in his favor - like being freaked out enough to disappear from the internet, "quit the biz" so to speak. He has not tried to cash in as far as we can tell. His testimony may hold weight based on these circumstances. He might be a very good witness for the prosecution. How will you impeach him?

ziggy wrote:Well first I'll address that just because you can recreate what happened forensically - you can't mitigate Sam's charges in those killings unless you negate the requisite mens rea...so while it will help to established what happened, it may not give the "why" and therefore without that - Sam can go down for 1st degree murder. You've been saying that the three women may have been a crime of passion or some other mitigating circumstance, but how will that come to light without it coming from Sam? That was the crux of my question.

(What do we call it...the admission instead of the confession? Since we don't have an actual police confession, I was referring to it as such. )
Next - Syn could be impeached as a witness, but he has some things in his favor - like being freaked out enough to disappear from the internet, "quit the biz" so to speak. He has not tried to cash in as far as we can tell. His testimony may hold weight based on these circumstances. He might be a very good witness for the prosecution. How will you impeach him?

Give me 2500 bucks and I have a PI who will find what is needed to impeach him.