Member Since: 11/27/2008
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Child abuse survivor was forced to kill his dad by stepmom
Quote:
DEFIANCE COUNTY
Woman gets life term for husband’s murder
BY JENNIFER FEEHAN
DEFIANCE — Only moments after a Defiance County judge told her she would spend the rest of her life in prison, Judith Hawkey turned to her husband seated in the front row of the courtroom and flashed a cheery smile.
The 46-year-old Oakwood, Ohio, woman was convicted last month of aggravated murder in the Nov. 3, 2003, death of her previous husband, Robert Breininger, after a jury in Defiance County Common Pleas Court found she had forced Mr. Breininger’s then-10-year-old son, Corey Breininger, to shoot him in the head with a shotgun in their Mark Center home, about 13 miles west of Defiance.
At the time of his death, the shooting was treated as an accident. Corey, emotionally distraught by what he’d been made to do, told sheriff’s deputies his father was showing him how to handle a gun when it discharged, and they accepted the story without further investigation.
The ruling changed from accident to homicide about a year ago after Corey, now 20, revealed the truth to a former teacher — a revelation that led to a new inquiry into the case and Hawkey’s indictment earlier this year. Defiance County Prosecutor Morris Murray said every bit of Corey's account of what occurred was backed up by the evidence in the case.
Judge Joseph Schmenk said a jury had been convinced otherwise. Following a two-week trial, Hawkey was found guilty not only of the aggravated murder but of insurance fraud for collecting some $500,000 in life insurance proceeds. She also was convicted of four counts of endangering children for inflicting years of physical and emotional abuse on Corey, whom she legally adopted a few years before Mr. Breininger was killed.
In a shaky voice, Corey Breininger, who was not charged, addressed the court, saying Hawkey caused pain to nearly everyone she encountered.
“In my opinion, you can’t put a value on somebody’s life,” he said. “Judith, however, thought my Dad was worth his insurance policy. If I could do anything, I’d bring my Dad back.”
Mr. Murray asked for the maximum sentence because of the staggering number of lives and relationships Hawkey destroyed.
He said Hawkey had personal and financial motives for doing what she did, and he noted she was at the door of Mr. Breininger’s insurance carrier within 24 hours of his death.
Worse than that, he said, she had abused her stepson — at one time telling him she would make him a girl, threatening to cut off his penis, and using a knife to cut him near his genitals. She also told him his father was dying of brain cancer.
“She was controlling over those years, overbearing, demanding, manipulative — frankly, evil,” Mr. Murray said.
“She took away from him a normal childhood and treated him in humiliating ways.”
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Read more at http://www.toledoblade.com/Courts/20...5UlBpCBAfUX.99
I know this article was from 2013, but this case was featured on the Oxygen series Snapped just last week.
Here is the interview Corey did for the show here: http://www.oxygen.com/snapped/season...s?clip=2889887
As well as interview with his paternal grandmother Anna:
http://www.oxygen.com/snapped/season...s?clip=2889890
Out of all the cases that have been covered on Snapped, this is one of the most evil and disturbing. How you can not only abuse a kid but then force him to kill his Dad or else... poor thing.
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