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Christina's Story
- Newspaper Articles
The following links take you to various articles in Christina's story
as it appeared in the South Florida media.
PLEASE DO NOT COPY THE INFORMATION ON THIS SITE BEFORE ASKING.
Thank you!
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In Loving Memory Of May 23, 1987 - September 16, 1994 "Beautiful Child who has found love from the angels...RIP..." |
 (Not her actual headstone) |
These
pages contain all of the articles from the Palm Beach Post and The
Sun-Sentinel throughout the years. |
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Extended 'Family'
Must Mobilize In Response To Killing Of Children (11/5/94)
Christina's Mom Charged With Murder (11/5/94)
Compassion Now Turned To Anger (11/5/94)
We Both Hit Christina, Her Stepfather Says (11/5/94)
Pauline Zile Held (11/5/94)
Hope Is Gone For Believers, For Innocence (11/5/94)
Reporting Suspected Abuse Required Under State Law (11/6/94)
Finally, Starting A Plan To Protect The Children (11/6/94)
If Hill Had Killed Zile, He Might Be a Hero (11/6/94)
Protecting Our Kids (11/6/94)
EXTENDED `FAMILY'
MUST MOBILIZE IN RESPONSE TO KILLING OF CHILDREN
Sun-Sentinel
November 5, 1994
A defenseless child is killed. And another. And another. And another.
And another.
We recoil in horror as the sad
news trickles into our consciousness, and many of us avoid the awful
details. It's almost beyond human emotional capacity to absorb the most
dreadful fact: In three of the five most recent slayings, a mother apparently
killed her own children.
In another, it was the stepfather who slew a child, with the mother
looking on and doing nothing. And a mother acting as a babysitter killed
someone else's baby - as well as her own.
In Florida and South Carolina, the lives of tiny children were snuffed out by adults. It's natural to back away from such abominable acts and to ask this: What kind of monster could kill her own children?
That's natural but insufficient, and we must confront the horror for the sake of other children. Helpful steps can be taken, some by the government but most by individuals or private groups, to improve prospects of life and health for America's vulnerable children.
The focus should be on strengthening families, defining that word more broadly than usual. It should encompass nuclear, extended and one-parent families. No-parent families must be brought into the mix, and so should each neighborhood, considered as a "family" of sorts in which residents look out for one another.
State government has a role in this, often as catalyst but sometimes as a direct provider of specific services. One strong example is the Healthy Start initiative of Florida Gov. Lawton Chiles, which relies on low-cost local coalitions for screening, medical care and social services for every child and pregnant woman.
One goal is a healthy infant, but the plan covers more. The harsh facts of modern life mean a pregnant female can be 13, 14 or 15 years old, with no knowledge about caring for a baby or parental responsibility.
Such a perilous situation can lead to child abuse, even killing, unless someone steps in with early, practical advice on caring for the baby. It can't end there, because a family has been created, with the responsibilities that entails.
The extended family can pitch in - if relatives live nearby. They can provide housing, child care and food while the young mother attends school. Neighborhood people, too, can lend a hand. Private groups should enlarge their help for shaky families. Many churches, temples and civic organizations already offer "outreach" programs, which could be expanded.
Isolation breeds anti-social behavior, and it's not enough for government and private groups to respond just to those who ask. It's up to individuals in each neighborhood to spot isolated families and try to break through the barriers and reach them.
None of this is easy. None of it guarantees success in eliminating child abuse. No one can be sure a state agency, such as Health and Rehabilitative Services, will protect children effectively.
Our awareness of child abuse has been intensified by the slaying of Christina Holt, 7, and four other defenseless youngsters. We can't shrug off this chance to make life safer - each of us acting separately and in groups - for our most vulnerable citizens.
CHRISTINA'S MOM CHARGED IN MURDER
SON, 5, TOLD FAMILY SECRET TO DETECTIVES
Sun-Sentinel
November 5, 1994
Author: MAREGO ATHANS and MIKE FOLKS Staff Writers
Staff Writers Jim Di Paola, Jill Young Miller, Stephanie Smith, Dawn
McMullan and Luisa Yanez contributed to this report.
Christina Holt's 5-year-old half brother told the awful secret his parents
had been hiding for six weeks.
Christina is "dead, dead,"
Daniel told investigators on Oct. 27, the day his father confessed to
killing the 7-year-old girl.
On Friday, prosecutors charged Pauline Zile with first-degree murder
and one count of aggravated child abuse for failing to protect Christina
when she was killed on Sept. 16, based on a litany of abuse and lies
detailed in a police affidavit.
"There is blood on Christina and blood on the bed," Daniel told police.
Pauline Zile is being held without bail in the Palm Beach County Jail.
Palm Beach County State Attorney Barry Krischer said he would seek indictments against her and her husband, John Zile, for first-degree felony murder.
Felony murder could result from aggravated child abuse, a felony, that leads to death. The charge does not require premeditation. The maximum sentence is death.
"At no time during this incident did Pauline Zile attempt to protect Christina from the punishment which led to her death," the affidavit says.
As Pauline Zile was being arrested at her attorney's Stuart office on Friday, John Zile was already behind bars, charged with first-degree murder and two counts of aggravated child abuse.
On Oct. 27, John Zile admitted beating Christina, covering her mouth with a towel to stifle her screams and killing her, then trying to revive her with cold water in a bathtub. He said he eventually buried her in a field behind a Kmart in Tequesta.
Pauline Zile watched it happen, then staged an elaborate ruse that the child had been abducted from the Fort Lauderdale Swap Shop, authorities say.
Statements from family, neighbors and other witnesses reveal a household where belts and sticks were common instruments of discipline, said the police affidavit supporting the charges against Pauline Zile.
The Ziles' two sons, Daniel, 5 and Chad, 3, told police that both parents "beat Christina's butt" lots of times and put her in the bathroom.
The boys weren't the only ones who knew the children suffered. Neighbors knew but mostly minded their own business.
Holly Walsh, a neighbor at the Sea Nymph apartments, told police she saw Pauline Zile strike Chad with a stick twice so severely that she asked Pauline Zile, "Is that really necessary?"
"On numerous occasions, she heard the children being beaten in their downstairs apartment," the affidavit says.
A family friend, Chad Brannon, told police that John Zile once pulled down Christina's pants to show off her welts. "The bruising was so noticeable and obvious that Brannon asked Christina to pull her pants back up because he did not want to see it."
Neighbor Linda Kauppinen, who moved in next to the Ziles on Sept. 5, said Pauline Zile once told her that Christina was a "snotty, spoiled child and she was too much to handle, so they sent her back up North to live with Grandma."
And Dale Ackerman, another witness, said that about seven weeks ago she heard a hitting sound and a young girl crying, then a woman say, "John, that's enough. Stop it."
When the crying and screaming suddenly stopped, Ackerman said, she heard a man's voice saying, `Wake up, wake up. I'm sorry.' " Then she heard running water in the bathroom.
The Ziles said they tried to revive the baby in the bathtub.
John Zile hid Christina's body in a closet for four days while he searched for a burial site, he told police. And when he found one, the grave digging became a family affair.
The Ziles went to Home Depot in Palm Beach Gardens around Sept. 19 to buy the shovel and blue tarp that John Zile used to bury Christina. They bought a rose bush, too, said Betty Schultze, who works at the store.
When Schultze asked 5-year-old Daniel if he was going to plant or grow the flowers, "He replied that [the) flowers were for his sister," the affidavit said.
Pauline Zile was pregnant, and said she didn't work.
"You've got your work cut out for you," Schultze said, referring to the children.
Pauline Zile then replied: "Lady, you don't know how true everything you're saying really is."
Pauline Zile went through elaborate measures to hide Christina's death, including withdrawing the girl from school. And on Oct. 18, more than a month after the child was killed, Pauline Zile went to an attorney to have legal documents notarized for custody from her in-laws. Christina had come to live with her in June.
Pauline Zile presented herself as a victim on Thursday, saying she has spent years as an abused and manipulated wife. She said she tried to call 911 the night Christina died, but John Zile told her she would get the electric chair.
But the State Attorney's Office showed no mercy. Neither did those who loved Christina, nor those who observed the tragedy through the media.
"I'm glad, really. She was a part of it," said Brenda Money, daughter of the great-grandparents in Maryland whom Christina lived with for most of her life.
The Palm Beach County medical examiner on Friday ruled Christina's death a homicide but has yet to rule on the cause of death. That ruling is expected to be determined by Monday, when the autopsy report will be presented to the grand jury, Krischer said. The arrest capped a draining two weeks for South Floridians caught up in the cases of three parents who confessed to killing their children. Last Saturday, a Royal Palm Beach woman admitted strangling two babies, her own and a friend's; on Thursday, a South Carolina woman confessed to killing her two sons.
The murders and phony abduction stories ignited what's-the-world-coming-to conversations in supermarkets and doctors' offices up and down the east coast.
"I hope she gets what she deserves," said Wayne Angst, of Jupiter, who visited the shrine at Christina's hastily dug grave with his wife and four daughters on Friday. "She's just as guilty as he is. If she had tried to stop him or called the police, that would be one thing. But to stuff her in a closet and go along with it is another."
"I hope they give them both the electric chair," said his wife, Elizabeth Angst.
Ellis Rubin, the Miami attorney made famous by his victimization defenses, accused prosecutors on Friday of posturing for the cameras. He said he volunteered to surrender Pauline Zile but prosecutors refused.
"They just wanted the media to have a picture of her being taken away in handcuffs," he said.
Krischer said authorities had no time to set up the woman's surrender.
Rubin also blamed South Florida radio stations for milking the "killer moms" angle.
"People want to see her strapped to the electric chair now with me sitting on her lap," Rubin said. "Why don't we have a trial before we convict her?"
At first, the investigation - and the public's wrath - focused on Walter John Zile, 32, the itinerant restaurant cook with a burglary conviction who confessed to the killing.
But in no time, it seemed everyone was asking the question on Ken Rice's mind on Friday as he visited the Christina shrine bathed in teddy bears and flowers: "What kind of woman would side with someone who killed her flesh and blood?" he said. "Parenthood is the one job where you don't have to meet any criteria."
People in Florida had a hard time buying Pauline Zile's victimization defense on Friday.
Among them: 16-year-old Tonya Ferguson, who has visited Christina's shrine several times, and on Friday came to leave a pumpkin in hopes its seeds would spawn a pumpkin patch.
"That was her kid, and I
don't understand why she wouldn't stand up for her kid," Ferguson
said.
COMPASSION NOW TURNED INTO ANGER
THOSE WHO HELPED ZILE ARE RESENTFUL OF HER RUSE
Sun-Sentinel
November 5, 1994
Author: HENRY FITZGERALD JR. Staff Writer
When Pauline Zile ran out of the Swap Shop bathroom seemingly hysterical,
clutching a blond doll and breathing heavily, Kim Bukowski offered to
help. Bukowski, an employee at Lorraine's Greenery at the Swap Shop,
brought Zile coffee and aspirin and tried to calm her.
Bukowski now knows the whole thing was a ruse to cover the death of Zile's daughter, Christina Holt, 7. Zile was convincing that Saturday afternoon when she said her daughter had just been abducted from a bathroom at the Swap Shop.
Pauline Zile was charged with first-degree murder on Friday.
"She had me completely fooled," Bukowski said. "She was shaking and crying, like something really had happened to Christina here. Everybody was saying that she was lying about the whole thing, but I believed her right up until the time she and her husband disappeared and the police had to find them."
Bukowski got involved this time and got burned. She won't bother anymore.
"It's a shame it takes someone like [Pauline Zile) to make me feel this way, but I'm not going to get involved from now on," Bukowski said.
Sellers at the flea market near Fort Lauderdale are feeling disbelief and anger.
Pauline Zile reported Christina missing from the Swap Shop on Oct. 22. Last week, Christina's stepfather, John Zile, said he beat the girl to death, then dumped her body in a field in Tequesta. John Zile was charged with murder.
Now, the ones who wanted to help Pauline Zile have turned against her.
"I remember she came by here looking frantic and handed me a flier with her daughter on it," said Michael Compton, who works at the Silk Gallery. "She acted like something had legitimately happened.
"I'd like to see her now," Compton said, his face hardening. "I'd give her a good thump."
Swap Shop officials say despite the phony call to help find Christina, they harbor no ill feelings.
"To us, it was just a part of our job," said spokesman Gerald Horner. "We don't want to be in the position where we question someone who really has lost their child."
* WE BOTH HIT CHRISTINA, HER STEPFATHER
SAYS *
S.C. BOYS WERE ALIVE, BUCKLED IN AS CAR SUNK
JOHN ZILE: HOW SHE DIED, WHY WE LIED
Miami Herald, The (FL)
November 5, 1994
Author: DAVID KIDWELL Herald Staff Writer
The man who killed Christina Holt said Friday that his wife left out
some details in her account of the child's death -- including the fact
that she had hit the girl herself two hours earlier.
"I can tell you that not all the bruises the medical examiners
will find on her body were from me," Zile said. "She smacked
Christina in the face a couple of times herself earlier that night."
In a 75-minute interview at the Palm Beach County Jail, Zile said that he didn't hit Christina hard enough to cause her death, explained how he needed incense to cover the smell of the child's decomposing body stashed for four days in the closet and rebutted Pauline's claims that she was locked in his domineering web.
"It's a pack of lies," Zile said through a window in the jail's mental health wing.
"Don't get me wrong; I've always loved her. I still do, even with what she's doing to me now. But don't let anyone tell you about this poor innocent victim.
"She may look that way now, crying all over the television, but she doesn't take any sh-- from anyone. She's the aggressive one."
Zile -- who has been held without bond on charges of first- degree murder and aggravated child abuse for eight days -- gave this account of the killing and the events leading up to it:
Christina came to them in June, having always lived with Pauline's ex-husband's family in Maryland. "She was great for the first couple of months, but they must have told her she was only coming for the summer or something," he said. "Because as soon as school started she realized she wasn't going back and the trouble started."
Zile said they enrolled Christina in Jupiter Farms Elementary School, nowhere near where they lived, by using the address of a friend. He said they didn't want her to go to the "99 percent black" school she would have attended.
Zile said Christina started misbehaving about 10 days before her death, often going to the bathroom on the floor and involving his two young sons in sexually oriented games.
"I don't know what happened to her up north, but she was a very troubled child," Zile said. "We caught her once in the closet with my 3-year-old. She had his pants down and was leaning over him."
That's when the spankings began, he said.
"I had some long discussions with her about it," he said. "We couldn't believe a 7-year-old was doing this."
Zile said Christina told them she had been sexually abused in Maryland. Police said Friday that Pauline told them of the incident and they are checking out the allegations in Maryland.
"I hit her and it was wrong," Zile said. "There's no excuse for what happened. There's no explanation that's good enough. But I just want people to understand my state of mind.
"For seven years I've been nothing but a loving and faithful husband and father," he said. "Then this started happening to my children and I became enraged."
Zile said there was another episode between Christina and one of his sons that day. "And she had diarrhea'd all over the closet again," he said.
"I remember telling Pauline that I was sick of being the bad guy all the time and I asked her why I have to do all the discipline all the time.
"That's when Pauline went back into the bedroom and smacked her a couple of times. When Pauline came out, I asked her what she did, and she said, 'I smacked her.' "
Zile said that as the family was watching Robocop on television he began questioning Christina about what happened to her in Maryland, and "she did it on the floor again. I saw it coming down her bathrobe. I was furious. I asked her why she did it and she said, 'Because I felt like it.' "
That's when the fatal beating began.
"Yeah, I spanked her," he said. "Her butt was black and blue. I popped her on the mouth, but nothing I did should've killed her. She started having a seizure."
Zile said that Christina had a history of epileptic seizures and apparently went into one during the attack.
"My dad used to beat me with a belt once in a while for lying and stuff, and I never thought anything about it," he said. "I didn't mean for her to die."
Zile said his wife was awake in the living room throughout the episode.
"We kind of panicked," he said. "We were trying to save her life. She was choking on her own vomit. I was trying to give her mouth to mouth. I was pounding on her chest. I used smelling salts. I put her in a cold bath, but she was dead."
He said Pauline suggested calling for help, but they decided against it together.
"We didn't know what the hell to do," he said. "We knew our lives were over. She had bruises on her butt. She had bruises on her face, some of which came from my wife -- the one's who's trying to act like an angel now.
"Christina was just 7 years old, she didn't deserve to die," Zile said. "But we felt like we didn't deserve to lose our lives either. I didn't deserve to lose my kids."
So Zile wrapped Christina's body in bedsheets and put her in the closet. Pauline went to bed, he said.
"She barely even cried," he said. "She fell asleep that night. I didn't. I couldn't sleep for three days."
The next day, Zile began looking for a place to bury the body. In the four days he spent looking for the spot, the girl's body lay in the closet decomposing.
"I had her wrapped pretty well, but it was starting to smell and that made the whole thing even more horrifying," Zile said. To cover the odor, he burned incense and opened windows.
"But I knew it was time to bury her," he said. Zile said he drove to his chosen spot, dug a 5 1/2-foot grave behind a Kmart in Tequesta, said a prayer over it, and went home. The couple spent the next month concocting a tale to cover the crime.
"We sat there on the couch and planned it together," he said. "She suggested we do it at a convenience store. I came up with the Swap Shop.
On Saturday, Oct. 22, they carried out the hoax, sparking a nationwide search for the missing girl. On Wednesday, Oct. 26, police had found enough holes in their story to confront them.
But the Ziles disappeared, driving their car to a Martin County orange grove to carry out a suicide pact. Their two sons -- Daniel, 5, and Chad, 3 -- had been left with friends. They are now under state care.
"We wrote five or six letters each," Zile said. "To family, to friends, to everybody, apologizing for all the effort there was looking for her. We didn't confess anything in the letters. We left open a ray of hope."
The notes have been recovered from the car, police sources said.
Zile said he rigged a hose to from the exhaust and the couple lay in the car for 90 minutes in the early morning hours of Oct. 27. "I couldn't figure out how to get it to work," he said. "I guess you need a garage or something.
"We killed off a whole bottle of Jim Beam and a bottle of NyQuil," he said.
Zile said claims by his wife's attorney that he was trying to kill Pauline to keep her quiet that night are false.
"I did get out of the car, but I took the hose with me," Zile said. "I never got out of that car and left it running exhaust inside. I was trying to get it to work."
They aborted the suicide attempt when they ran low on gasoline, he said. Within minutes, they were picked up by police.
Zile said he and Pauline reported together to the Riviera Beach Police Department, where they both confessed after a long day of interrogation.
Pauline caved first, after failing a lie-detector test.
Zile said Palm Beach County State Attorney Barry Krischer interviewed him about telling police where the body was buried. "I asked him what I could do to help Pauline, what I could do to help myself," Zile said. "He said I was already charged with first-degree murder, and that he couldn't make any promises, but maybe it could be involuntary manslaughter or accidental death if I cooperated."
Zile then agreed to lead police to the burial site.
Zile shook his head as he read for the first time a statement written by Pauline that was released to reporters on Thursday. In it, Pauline blasted John for ruining her life.
"You and God know the truth of all this and how you hurt me and our children so much," she wrote.
At the same news conference, on
the steps of the Palm Beach state attorney's office, Pauline Zile's
attorney, Ellis Rubin, said John Zile beat the child to death while
the mother slept and then coerced her with threats of the electric chair
if she
went for help; that Zile used money that was supposed to go for Pauline's
epilepsy medicine and for food for the kids to feed his marijuana habit.
Rubin said Zile beat Pauline once several years ago. Rubin even said
that after the murder, John attempted to kill Pauline to keep her quiet.
"What a crock; none of it's true," Zile said Friday.
"What's happening is that you've got a money-grubbing sleazy attorney, along with her mother, telling her this is what she has to do to stay out of jail and get her kids back.
"I told her that night she could go get help if she wanted to," Zile said. "She said no, I don't want to lose you and my kids. All this time she's making all these decisions on her own. I'm not forcing her to do anything. She's always been a very independent woman."
Zile said Pauline hasn't taken her medicine in five years, that he never beat her or his kids until September when he began spanking Christina. He also said he and Pauline had a suicide pact, and he never dreamed of killing his wife.
"Think about it, how could I have forced her to go to Fort Lauderdale -- away from my power, away from my so-called emotional grip -- and then keep that whole thing up for a week?"
Zile also said he misses his children and wishes Pauline had called police from the very start of the disciplining, before things got out of hand.
"If she had called them, just once, her little girl would be alive right now and I wouldn't be facing the electric chair.
"I'm awfully sorry, I have
this incredible remorse, but we had to play it out like we did to save
our own lives -- to keep
from being thrown to the wolves."
PAULINE ZILE HELD
Miami Herald, The (FL)
November 5, 1994
Author: JUDY PLUNKETT EVANS And LORI ROZSA Herald Staff Writers
Pauline Zile went to jail Friday, one week after her daughter's battered
body was unearthed from a sandy grave, sparking a public outcry for
her arrest.
Police used statements from witnesses -- including Zile's two young
sons -- to charge her with first-degree murder and aggravated child
abuse.
Zile's husband, John, was arrested Oct. 27, after confessing to beating 7-year-old Christina Holt to death because she soiled her pants and wouldn't stop crying.
According to Pauline Zile's arrest affidavit, released by a judge's order late Friday, the couple's two young boys, Chad, 3, and Daniel, 5, told investigators that "Dada and momma beat Christina's butt lots of times" and put her in the bathroom.
Chad Zile told police Christina doesn't live at home any
more. Daniel Zile told them she was "dead, dead," and that there was blood on her.
Other witnesses, including neighbors at the tiny Singer Island motel where the Ziles were living, also recounted abuse they saw or heard.
The most chilling comes from Dale Ackerman, a neighbor. One night, she heard a man yelling in the Ziles' apartment, and "a hitting sound," and a young girl crying and screaming. Ackerman said then she heard a woman saying, "John, that's enough. Stop it."
According to the affidavit: "Ackerman continued to hear slapping sounds . . . then describes the crying and screaming stopping abruptly after which she heard a man's voice saying 'Wake up, wake up, I'm sorry.' "
After police began to suspect the Ziles in Christina's disappearance, they gave Pauline Zile limited immunity, because her statement with the details of Christina's death led to her husband's confession.
She told police she was asleep when the beating began, and awoke midway through the assault, but said it was too late to stop it. The second-grader went into convulsions and died within minutes.
But, according to the affidavit, "(John) Zile stated his wife, Pauline Zile was present in the living room when the incident began and witnessed the entire incident. At no time during this incident did Pauline Zile attempt to protect Christina from the punishment which led to her death."
The fact that Pauline Zile remained
free after her husband's arrest aroused furious public sentiment, much
of it
from people who initially believed her widely publicized pleas that
her child had been kidnapped, when in fact she knew that the little
girl had been dead for weeks.
State Attorney Barry Krischer refused to comment on the evidence against Pauline Zile, except to say that it was independent of the statement she gave police a week ago.
Krischer said he wanted to jail Pauline Zile as soon as possible because he was afraid she would flee.
"My concern was that there has been no court hold on her," Krischer said. "She could leave this jurisdiction at any time she wanted."
Guy Rubin, one of Pauline Zile's attorneys, said the arrest is political, that Krischer was under intense public pressure to charge the mother.
"She's certainly no risk of flight. She's been cooperating," Rubin said. "Her only ties in the world are here."
Her mother, Paula Yingling, lives in Jensen Beach.
Zile, 24, was arrested Friday morning in Stuart as she came out of the elevator at her attorney's office. She was on her way to West Palm Beach, to turn herself in, Rubin said. He had been called by reporters, who said an arrest warrant had been issued for Pauline Zile.
Zile was taken to the Martin County Jail, then transported to the Palm Beach County Jail, where she was placed in the mental health unit. She is being held without bond and will make her first appearance before a judge today.
John Zile, 32, hid Christina's body in a closet for four days before he found a place to bury her in Tequesta, behind a Kmart shopping center. Police say he wrapped her body in a blue tarp, and secured it with tape. After John Zile confessed last Thursday, he showed police Christina's grave.
The cause of Christina's death still has not been released by the medical examiner.
Krischer said he is proceeding under the theory of felony murder, which states that a person is guilty of first-degree murder if the victim was killed during the commission of a felony. In this case, if the Ziles were abusing Christina or witnessing the abuse, both actions are felonies and they would be equally guilty of murder.
Attorney Ellis Rubin said Thursday that he expected charges to be filed against Pauline Zile, and added that he would use a battered-woman defense. Rubin said John Zile controlled his wife, using the family's food money to buy marijuana.
The Ziles concocted an elaborate tale to cover Christina's disappearance, telling police the girl had been abducted from a restroom at the Fort Lauderdale Swap Shop.
When Pauline Zile wavered about telling the story, her husband told her she would go to the electric chair if she told the truth, Guy Rubin said Friday. He also convinced her to attempt suicide when police wanted to question them, but the attempt failed, Rubin said.
"If we're found out, you're going to fry," Rubin said John Zile told his wife.
Krischer said he does not know whether he will seek the death penalty against the Ziles, and will not decide until after the grand jury votes whether to indict the couple. The grand jury already has heard some evidence in the case and will meet again Monday. If the panel votes not to indict, the Ziles would go free, Krischer said.
HOPE IS GONE FOR BELIEVERS, FOR
INNOCENCE
Miami Herald, The (FL)
November 5, 1994
Author: LIZ BALMASEDA Herald Columnist
The tears of a young mother and her story of terror at the hands of
a carjacker/kidnapper set off a national manhunt and a nine-day vigil.
Candles flickered for her missing children. Prayers swept through sacred
places. Yellow ribbons appeared all over the Southern mill town where
she lived a quiet life.
People believed Susan Smith, 23, when she told the nation she was ditched
on a desolate road by an armed black man in a
knit cap who abducted her two young sons, 3-year-old Michael and 14-month-old
Alex, and drove away in her wine-colored Mazda.
It was the edge of town, a lonely spot near the lake. How could she make this up?
People believed her because she fits a certain profile of credibility: a young, white, small-town mother.
Susan Smith comes from a place where bad things don't happen.
That's what the baptist minister said on Nightline.
I've never been to Union, S.C., but I imagine it's the kind of town you're either born in or move to when you want to get away from big-city life and its complexities -- crime, immigrants, minorities.
"Bad things do not happen to us here," the preacher said.
But now Susan Smith has been charged with the murder of her children.
Her car was pulled out of John D. Long Lake with two small bodies in the back seat.
Her arrest comes days after the unraveling of another tale of child abduction. It comes days after the country watched Pauline Zile, clutching the doll of her missing 7-year-old daughter Christina Holt tell how her little girl disappeared at the Swap Shop.
Zile's husband was charged in the murder. On Friday, Zile, too, was charged in the murder of her child.
But for a while, people believed her, too.
It is not only that they believed her story, but that they wanted to believe her story.
The masses would first suspect every anonymous black man in America before they would look beyond the image of Middle America motherhood.
What did people know about Susan Smith when they began to pray for her and tie yellow ribbons for her children? But they believed her.
They believed Charles Stuart, the guy from Boston who in 1989 told the horrible story of how his pregnant wife had been shot to death. The gunman in his story, of course, was a black man. And unlike the skeptical investigators who swooped in on Smith in South Carolina, the police in Boston took a lot longer to figure out there was no black man with a gun. By the time they zoomed in on Stuart, white, he had jumped to his death off a bridge.
Appearances of innocence.
OK, I also know people who were suspicious of Smith from the start. My sister, for instance: "She didn't cry like a mother whose children were missing."
But there is a lot of anger in Union today, and a lot of people who feel not only pain for the loss of the children, but betrayal.
The lesson here is not one about white lies. It is about what we perceive as credible, and what we perceive as suspicious.
A little bit of everyone, believers and disbelievers, died with Michael and Alex, with Christina.
Outside the Union County courthouse Friday, they called Susan Smith a "baby murderer." Let's hope, for the sake of missing children who might still be alive, she does not inspire yet another profile -- the new killer mother.
In her small Southern town, they're taking down yellow ribbons.
And all hope is gone for the only innocents.
REPORTING SUSPECTED ABUSE REQUIRED
UNDER STATE LAW
The Palm Beach Post
November 6, 1994
Author: JENNY STALETOVICH
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer
The brief, torturous months Christina Holt spent living with her mother
and stepfather were filled with violence and beatings that were witnessed
by neighbors and friends, reports revealed this week.
Yet while Christina suffered,
the witnesses never told anyone who could have helped her.
They should have, according to state law.
Failing to report suspected child abuse is a second-degree misdemeanor. But because such cases are difficult to try and the penalty is so slight, charges rarely are filed, say sources in the State Attorney's Office.
Christina's decomposed body was unearthed last week after investigators discovered the story of the 7-year-old's death.
John Zile, 32, has told investigators that in mid-September he was punishing his stepdaughter for ``sexual activity'' when she collapsed in convulsions and died.
But neighbors have told police that before that night, they heard a child's screams and the sounds of beatings in the Ziles' Singer Island apartment. One neighbor questioned Christina's mother, Pauline Zile, 24, about beating her 3-year-old son with a stick.
A friend said he watched John Zile pick Christina up over his head and throw her on a bed. He also saw Zile beat Christina with a belt, then order Christina to pull her pants down and show the bruises.
The friend, Chad Brannon, told police he asked Zile to have Christina pull up her pants because he couldn't bear to see the bruises.
School officials said Christina attended school only four days after enrolling on Aug. 23.
But no one told authorities.
``The intent of the statute is to say you've got to get involved,'' said a prosecutor who did not want his name used. ``If you know something's abusive, you have to report it.''
But proving someone knew of abuse and failed to report it is often difficult because the burden of proof rests in a vague area: knowing a person's reasoning.
``If we had a situation in a neighborhood with four or five adults outside a house, and they witness a neighbor beating the tar out of a 3-year-old kid, and nobody reports it, that's a situation that's very clear,'' the prosecutor said. ``It's kind of like a `knew' or `should have known' and applying a reasonable standard.''
FINALLY, STARTING A PLAN TO PROTECT
THE CHILDREN
The Palm Beach Post
November 6, 1994
We teach our children to beware of strangers. How do we protect them
from their parents?
First we heard about Christina
Holt, allegedly killed by her stepfather. (On Friday, her mother was
also charged with first-degree murder.) Then it was Michael and Alexander
Smith, allegedly killed by their mother in Union, S.C.
Last week, a coalition of Palm Beach County business and social-services
leaders challenged residents to take a community approach to preventing
child abuse. They weren't admitting defeat. They were emphasizing that
government can't do it alone. The coalition - the Children's Services
Council, United Way, the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative
Services, the economic council and others - will have a public meeting
at 4 p.m. Thursday at the United Methodist Church of the Palm Beaches
in West Palm Beach. Members will try to channel the public's outrage
into a plan that uses every willing volunteer's time and talents. They
will lay out their ideas and ask for yours. For starters:
* Flood the county with brochures listing the Center Line (formerly Crisis Line) number and others for reporting abuse. Publicize numbers for help with substance abuse, unplanned pregnancy and emergency food and clothing.
* Require a course called Responsibility 101 in middle schools. Teach students that in order to eat, have a place to live and a car to drive - and certainly to have a child - people must behave responsibly, work at a job and marry before childbearing.
* Offer free or low-cost parenting classes throughout the county. Call them Raising Terrific Kids so everyone wants to take them.
* Target ``young grandparents,'' women who had babies as teenagers and are helping raise their teenagers' babies. Neither generation ever learned parenting skills.
* Prevent unwanted pregnancies. The Florida Kids Count Data Book shows that Healthy Start, providing prenatal and infant care for the poor, has reduced infant mortality. Now reduce unplanned pregnancies.
* Expand school-based clinics. The pregnancy rate at Glades Central High School in Belle Glade plummeted when kids could get reliable information and birth-control prescriptions.
Even with the best plan, however, not all abuse is preventable. Rational people tend to ascribe rational feelings to emotionally unstable people. Consider that Pauline Zile continued to bring her son to kindergarten at Jupiter Farms Elementary School even as Christina's body lay first in a closet, then in a shallow grave. When Christina's teacher asked about the girl, Ms. Zile cooly gave believable excuses: Christina's been ill; Christina's having an adjustment problem; she's gone back to Maryland for a little while. We're thinking about home schooling . . .
Finally, we should not respond to extremist views. We must support and improve those agencies that protect children. The ill-named Family Rights Committee was founded by John Ostalkiewicz, a newly elected state senator from Central Florida. The committee has charged HRS with using ``Gestapo'' tactics in removing children from potentially abusive homes. But Family Rights Committee members never say how children should be protected. They just want HRS to butt out.
And if that happened? ``My God,''
says Suzanne Turner, the HRS director for Palm Beach County,
``I don't even want to think . . . ''
IF HILL HAD KILLED ZILE, HE MIGHT
BE A HERO
The Palm Beach Post
November 6, 1994
Author: JAC VERSTEEG
Suppose that when John Zile was beating his stepdaughter, Christina
Holt, to death someone had walked in and killed Zile with a pistol.
The shooter would be a hero. In
his own mind, Paul Hill is that kind of hero.
Hill is the man convicted Wednesday in the murders of Dr. John Bayard
Britton and James Barrett, who were killed outside a Pensacola abortion
clinic. Hill had claimed the shootings were justifiable because he was
preventing the murder of unborn children. He wasn't allowed to make
that argument during the trial, so he offered no defense. But there
are people who accept his argument.
What is the difference between Hill and Christina's imaginary rescuer? The most pertinent difference in court is that the law recognizes that Christina was a human being. A fetus prior to viability does not have that status. Put simply, Hill was not trying to rescue a person.
Plenty of people dispute that distinction. They think the law is wrong and are trying to change it. But they're not ready to become vigilantes. Paul Hill and people who condone what he did claim a special status above the law. Democracies are rightly dubious of claims to special legal privileges of any sort. When that privilege supposedly comes from God and grants the right to kill, democracy is abandoned for theocracy.
Focus now on the moment of shooting. Christina's imaginary hero stepped into the middle of a crime being committed. There was no time to call for help, no way to reason with the man beating Christina. There was hardly time to think at all. Immediate action was required to prevent imminent injury to the child. Even in that hypothetical case, prosecutors might argue that the shooter used too much force. He could have aimed for the legs or an arm.
Hill shot his victims while they were in a truck outside the clinic. He did not wander into a heated argument. He did not face armed assailants in the act of injuring a child. He had plenty of time to think. There's a disturbing element of premeditation to it all.
But even if Hill had burst in during an abortion procedure, the comparison between Hill and someone saving a child in danger simply doesn't fit. That gets to a crucial difference in how most people respond emotionally to Christina's plight and the fate of an aborted fetus.
All of us can imagine Christina's terror and despair. But it was not imaginary. The 7-year-old actually lived it. She was sentient in a way a fetus is not. Christina can be loved - and pitied - in a way a fetus cannot.
Even when abortion was illegal, doctors and others who performed the operation were not generally considered to have committed homicide, unless, as happened too often, the woman died. The view that abortion is not the same as infanticide can even be seen toward the far-right fringes of the anti-abortion crowd. Jeb Bush, for example, approves of abortion in cases of rape or incest or when necessary to save the woman's life. Can you imagine anyone advocating infanticide in similar cases? Only at the very extreme, where Paul Hill lives, is abortion absolutely equated with murder.
It is quite possible to love, respect or cherish an unborn child. Those emotions are pegged to the fetus' potential to become a human being. That potential should not be cut off lightly. And it's proper to protect viable fetuses, as abortion law does now. But the potential child we imagine is not an actual child. That's why killing to ``rescue'' a fetus that could legally be aborted always is murder, whereas killing to rescue a child can be justifiable.
Hill and his extremist supporters would have us believe that he's like the fictional rescuer we all wish could have saved Christina from her stepfather. In fact, when the line is drawn between good and evil, Hill and Zile are on the same side.
Jac Wilder VerSteeg is an editorial writer for The Palm Beach Post.
PROTECTING OUR KIDS
The Palm Beach Post
November 6, 1994
WHAT THE COURTS ARE DOING
MOST CASES END IN PLEA BARGAINS
At the state attorney's office, most child abuse cases end in plea bargains.
Half of the 16 defendants who went to trial this year were found guilty,
seven were found not guilty and one ended in a mistrial.
``Cases that tend to go to trial are marginal, and that's why the defendant wants to go to trial, or we've offered such a high plea bargain that they decide to take a chance at trial,'' said Chief Assistant State Attorney Paul Zachs. ``The stronger cases, they just plead to.''
State Attorney Barry Krischer, who came to office in January 1993, has assigned seasoned trial prosecutors to the child division. Currently seven attorneys are assigned to prosecute crimes against children. Prosecutors say they do not keep statistics.
THE PROBLEM
THE 10 WAYS WE HURT OUR KIDS
10 most common forms of child abuse in 1992-93:
1. Sexual molestation
2. Bruises/welts
3. Excessive punishment, beatings
4. Sexual battery (no incest)
5. Drug-dependent newborn
6. Sexual battery (incest)
7. Sexual exploitation
8. Cuts, punctures, bites
9. Substance abuse
10. Other mental injury
* Source: Florida Abuse Hotline Information System.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
ABUSE HOTLINE
The Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services receives 250,000 reports of abuse to its Abuse Hotline each year. About 50,000 cases eventually are confirmed. Officials say anyone reporting abuse also should call 911, especially if a child is in danger.
Here's how the state Department of Health and Rehabilitative Service's Abuse Hotline works:
1. The person reporting abuse dials (800) 96-ABUSE.
2. A message in Spanish and English asks the caller to press 1 to report abuse, neglect or exploitation; or press 2 for information about services or general information.
3. A person calling with an abuse report will be directed to one of 77 counselors. The counselor will ask the caller for specifics. Callers do not have to leave their names, but if they do, HRS officials say, only the abuse investigator will have access to it.
4. If the counselor decides there is possible abuse or neglect, the report is entered into the state's computer system, known as the abuse registry.* The counselor then does a record check to see if there is a history of abuse.
5. A Palm Beach County investigator receives the message from the registry in Tallahassee, noting whether the situation requires immediate attention (when a child is in danger) or attention within 24 hours.
6. The local HRS official begins an investigation or helps the family get services. * A new system, expected to be in place by the end of the year, will allow local officials to delay placing a name in the abuse registry as a possible abuser until a special response team decides whether there is possible abuse.
WHERE TO TURN
Here are agencies that parents and caregivers can turn to before a bad home situation turns tragic.
ADAM WALSH CHILD
RESOURCE CENTER
Address: 9176 Alternate A1A, Suite 100, Lake Park
Contact: Jean Peterson, program coordinator, 848-1900
Purpose: Tells students how to prevent abduction and sexual abuse and provides support and information for parents of missing children.
AID TO VICTIMS OF DOMESTIC
ASSAULT INC. (AVDA)
Contact: Shandra Dawkins, executive director, 265-3797.
Crisis phone: 265-2900
Purpose: Provides counseling on domestic violence, emergency shelter for battered women and children.
CENTER FOR CHILDREN IN CRISIS INC., FAMILY SEXUAL ABUSE TREATMENT PROGRAM
Address: 2120 S. Congress Ave., West Palm Beach
Contact: Martha Rubio, clinical supervisor, 641-1500
Purpose: Provides counseling and group therapy to victims of incest, to family members and to adolescent male sex offenders.
CENTERLINE (formerly Crisis Line)
Crisis phone: 930-1234
Contact: Sheryl Lenz, director, 547-8637
Purpose: 24-hour crisis service and information referral service.
CHILDREN'S HOME SOCIETY
SOUTH COASTAL DIVISION
Address: 3600 Broadway, West Palm Beach
Contact: Cheryl Moody, program director, 844-9785
Purpose: Provides in-home counseling and training to parents at risk or with a history of abuse.
CHILDREN'S RESOURCE COUNCIL OF PALM BEACH COUNTY, INC.
Address: 401 N. Dixie Highway, West Palm Beach
Contact: Mike VanWagoner, director, 355-7188
Purpose: Brings together investigators and others to ensure children aren't traumatized during investigation.
CHILDREN'S SERVICES COUNCIL
Address: 3111 S. Dixie Highway, West Palm Beach
Contact: Marlene Passell, 655-1010
Purpose: Plans, pays for finance and evaluates programs and public policy for children
THE CHILDREN'S PLACE
CONNOR'S NURSERY
Address: 2309 Ponce de Leon Ave., West Palm Beach
Contact: Nancy Lambretch, 832-6185
Purpose: Provides residential care, case management, counseling for children up to age 6.
FOSTER CARE CITIZEN REVIEW OF THE PALM BEACHES
Address: 300 N. Dixie Highway, Room 107, West Palm Beach
Contact: Kathy Carter, executive director, 355-2091
Purpose: Recruits and trains volunteers for panels that review cases of children in foster care.
FOSTER PARENTS ASSOCIATION OF PALM BEACH COUNTY
Address: 3951 Haverhill Road, Suite 213, West Palm Beach
Contact: Shirley Fitzgerald, 686-9770
Purpose: Provides in-service training and support for foster parents.
GUARDIAN AD LITEM, VOLUNTEER TRAINING PROGRAM
Address: D&D Center, 100 block, N. Dixie Highway, West Palm Beach
Contact: Lois Messer, trainer, 355-2773
Purpose: Provides training for guardians ad litem, who are assigned by courts to represent the interests of children in abuse and neglect cases.
HAITIAN CENTER FOR
FAMILY SERVICES
Address: 3359 Belvedere Road, Suite E, West Palm Beach
Contact: Marie Lafalaise, executive director, 688-2520
Purpose: Provides parenting classes in Creole to families referred by HRS.
PARENT-CHILD CENTER
Address: Yellow Brick Road Learning Center, 4802 East Ave., West Palm Beach
Contact: Gail Vicars, intake specialist, 688-9113, ext. 23
Purpose: Provides individual and family therapy, parent education, intervention and therapeutic preschool for children in foster care and under HRS Child Protective Services.
YMCA OF PALM BEACH COUNTY INC.,
HARMONY HOUSE-DOMESTIC VIOLENCE EMERGENCY SERVICES
Address: 901 S. Olive Ave., West Palm Beach
Contact: April Van Orman, director, 833-2439
Crisis phone: 655-6106
Purpose: Provides support for children of battered women at the shelter.
THE VICTIMS
JUDITH JEAN-JACQUES
Home: West Palm Beach
Date of death: Sept. 28, 1990
Age: 7 1/2 months
Cause of death: Head trauma
Circumstances: Skull crushed; family said baby fell.
Disposition: Stepbrother, age 12, convicted.
KENDRIC HUMPHREY
Home: Riviera Beach
Date of death: July 10, 1991
Age: 4 1/2 months
Cause of death: Shaken Baby Syndrome
Circumstances: Baby shaken to death
Disposition: Unknown
LOUIS RIVERA
Home: Lake Worth
Date of death: Sept. 30, 1991
Age: 21 months
Cause of death: Blunt head trauma
Circumstances: Parents said baby fell out of bed.
Disposition: Mother's live-in boyfriend charged. Trial set for Dec. 2.
SHARLENE DERONCELER
Home: West Palm Beach
Date of death: July 30, 1992
Age: 12 weeks
Cause of death: Head trauma
Circumstances: Beaten until semiconscious. Died at West Boca Medical Center. Disposition: Father convicted.
DONNIE DEVEAUX
Home: West Palm Beach
Date of death: Dec. 28, 1992
Age: 22 months
Cause of death: Head trauma
Circumstances: Parents had history of abuse.
Disposition: Father convicted.
ANDREW `A.J.' SCHWARZ
Home: Lantana
Date of death: May 2, 1993
Age: 10
Cause of death: Drowning
Circumstances: Bruised body found in backyard swimming pool.
Disposition: Stepmother convicted of child abuse, charged with murder.
KAYLA BASANTE
Home: Palm Springs
Date of death: Nov. 23, 1993.
Age: 9 months
Cause of death: Asphyxia Circumstances: Found at home.
Disposition: Baby sitter charged.
DAYTON BOYKIN
Home: Royal Palm Beach
Date of death: Oct. 27
Age: 5 months
Cause of death: Asphyxia
Circumstances: Found dead in crib
Disposition: Mother charged.
CHRISTINA HOLT
Home: Riviera Beach
Date of death: Oct. 28
Age: 7
Cause of death: Pending
Circumstances: Body wrapped in a blanket, tent and tarp and buried.
Disposition: Stepfather and mother charged.
ALEXANDER PURNELL
Home: Fort Pierce
Date of death: Sept. 29, 1990
Age: 2 1/2
Cause of death: Physical abuse
Circumstances: Shaken by his stepfather in 1989 and died a year later in a foster home.
Disposition: Stepfather pleaded guilty.
TORIANO SEARS
Home: Fort Pierce
Date of death: July 8, 1991
Age: 8 months
Cause of death: Blunt trauma
Circumstances: Suffered a ruptured intestine.
Disposition: Father pleaded no contest.
TERRELL JOHNSON
Home: Fort Pierce
Date of death: Nov. 24, 1992
Age: 6 months
Cause of death: Closed head injury
Circumstances: Shaken by mother.
Disposition: Mother pleaded no contest; sentenced to house arrest and probation. SHANELLIE MCCLAIN
Home: Fort Pierce
Date of death: March 16, 1993
Age: 3 months
Cause of death: Blunt head injury
Circumstances: Slammed against the floor by mother, who is mentally retarded. Disposition: Mother pleaded no contest.
SHUNTA DENISE CARAWAY
Home: Riviera Beach
Date of death: Aug. 23, 1990
Age: 2
Cause of death: Blunt trauma
Circumstances: Beaten with wire, cord and belt
Disposition: Mother and boyfriend convicted.
WHAT THE SCHOOLS ARE DOING
INITIAL TRAINING
As undergraduates, many teachers take courses to help them recognize the victims of abuse. All new teachers in the Palm Beach County School District must complete a three-hour program on recognizing the signs and symptoms of drug abuse, child abuse and suicide.
WHEN TEACHERS SPOT ABUSE:
The Palm Beach County School District policy says that any school personnel who have reason to suspect a child is being abused must tell the principal, who will report it to HRS.
Abuse includes physical or mental injury, sexual battery or abuse, neglect, abandonment, failure to provide supervision by acts or omissions, and if a parent exploits or allows exploitation of a child.
Principals may set up their own policies, requiring teachers to report suspicions directly to the HRS Hot-line or to a designated guidance counselor within the school. That counselor then might call HRS.
DEALING WITH A CHILD'S PAST ABUSE
The principal and often the guidance counselor are informed by HRS of the child's history. But the information is restricted to those school personnel the principal believes need to know about the child's past.
A teacher, for example, might be told not to release the child to his father. But the teacher is not necessarily privy to details of the case.
It is HRS' responsibility, not the school's, to track the child and direct the child to appropriate counseling.
Most schools have guidance counselors on campus. And some guidance counselors offer group counseling for students, but it is not the intense counseling a child would need immediately after being abused.
SIGNS OF ABUSE
THE RED FLAGS
Any of these could be indications of physical abuse, particularly when physical signs are combined with emotional reactions:
PHYSICAL SIGNS
Sprains
Dislocated bones
Bone fracture
Burns and scalds
Bruises
Skull fracture, brain damage
Cuts, punctures and bites
Internal injuries
BEHAVIORAL SIGNS
Denial of abuse
Fear of family
Wary of adults
Looks for approval from parents before answering questions
Poor self-image
Self-blaming
Complains excessively
Overreacts
Hyperalertness
Overly dependent on non-abusive parent
Either overly passive or overly aggressive
Overly affectionate
Defensive of family
Does not look for reassurance from parents
No emotional bonding
Relationship between child and guardians poor
Role reversal
Fear of home
Becomes apprehensive when adult approaches a crying child
Withdrawn
Disruptive behavior
Regression in school work
Poor hygiene
Flinches from physical touch
Sleep disorders
Nervousness, stuttering and other speech difficulties
Source: State Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services
The following Palm Beach Post reporters compiled the information for this special report: Jounice L. Nealy
Scott Shifrel
Christine Stapleton
Meg James
William Cooper Jr.
Sonja Isger
Jill Taylor
Mary Lou Pickel
Pat Moore
Jim Reeder
WHO DOES THE CRIMES
While the public thinks that more men than women abuse children, that's
not always true. In Palm Beach County in 1992-93. 53 percent of the
adults who abused children were women.
VICTIMS BY AGE
The targets of child abuse span all ages but girls are more frequently
abused than boys in Palm Beach County.
WHO REPORTS ABUSE
Only 17 percent of abuse complaints in Palm Beach County are anonymous.
relatives and neighbors call in the highest number of abuse tips - nearly
30 percent.