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DAs
want death penalty when elderly are killed
By
Mark Belko Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette, June 27, 2003 District attorneys in five Western Pennsylvania counties will seek changes in state law to allow them to automatically seek the death penalty against suspects accused of killing the elderly. Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. said yesterday that he has asked state Rep. Harry Readshaw and state Sens. Jay Costa and Sean Logan to sponsor the legislation, which would apply in cases where the victims were at least 70 years old. The proposal also has the support of district attorneys in Beaver, Washington, Butler and Lawrence counties. The change would be made to an existing law that makes killing a minor an aggravating circumstance that allows prosecutors to seek the death penalty. Zappala said the law remains "incomplete" without similar provisions for elderly victims. He said seven other states have such provisions, including Florida, Arizona, Illinois, Delaware and New Hampshire. Zappala announced that he would seek the death penalty against Patrick Jason Stollar, 25, of Washington County, in the June 4 robbery and murder of 78-year-old Jean Heck of Upper St. Clair. Stollar, who had done yard work for Heck earlier in the spring, is accused of beating, stomping and stabbing her before ransacking her house. He told police he had gone to the house "with nothing less than the intention to take her life." "She's dead because of her age. She's dead because she couldn't fight back," Zappala said of Heck. The decision by the district attorneys to seek a change in the law came in response to a rash of cases over the past few years involving home invasions in which the victims were elderly. Zappala said the Heck case "reaffirmed to us that criminals have clearly and unequivocally targeted older members of our community." In Allegheny County, the district attorney's office listed 19 cases since November 2000 in which people ranging in age from 69 to 90 were victimized, most of them in their homes. In Washington County, authorities are still hunting four men who impersonated gas company workers and entered the Peters home of Shannon and Freda Dale on Jan. 29, beating Shannon, 91, and tying up his 89-year-old wife, frightening her so badly that she died. Zappala and Washington County District Attorney John Pettit and Beaver County District Attorney Dale Fouse, both of whom attended yesterday's news conference, said that at least some home invasions are the result of organized gangs or rings that travel into Western Pennsylvania and other areas specifically to target elderly residents. Authorities believe that Michael D. Marks, who is charged with homicide and other crimes in Dale's death, is patriarch of a family that has been implicated in a number of break-ins and attacks in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Members of the Marks family also have been charged with burglaries in White Oak, Bridgeville and McCandless. Should Allegheny County prosecutors find home invasions are the result of organized gangs, the suspects, Zappala said, will be charged with racketeering, formally known as corrupt organization, which carries a 20-year jail term. "This is their business," he said of the home invasions, "and there is going to be a ramification to their business." It hasn't been decided, however, whether the district attorney will seek racketeering charges in the White Oak, Bridgeville and McCandless cases. "There is no doubt in the district attorney's mind that members of the Marks family are professional criminals and that crime is how they make their living," Zappala spokesman Mike Manko said. "Having said that, it will take an analysis of the evidence once they are in custody before we can finally determine whether their behavior fits the statute." Fouse said it became evident to authorities during court proceedings relating to an elderly couple that had been victimized by a burglary in Beaver County that they were targeted. "As the evidence came out, it was clear that the defendants had been studying this house and these folks for a long period of time," he said. While some burglaries are the result of organized groups, others appear to involve suspects who act alone and who have drug habits, Pettit said. "They look for the weak targets, so they were targeting the elderly," he said. Copyright
© 2002 Global Action on Aging |
