ZACHARY DUTRO-BOGGESS - 3 yo - (2012) / Charged, Mother, Jessica Dutro - Washington County, OR

Jessica Dutro murder trial opens; defense blames boyfriend in killing of Tigard 4-year-old

March 24, 2014 at 7:24 PM




Jessica Dutro ran her family “like an army,” attorneys said at the start of her murder trial Monday.

Her children were well-behaved. They marched in a line from their room in a homeless shelter to the communal dining table. When they were finished eating, they rested their heads on the table.

Deputy District Attorney Dustin Staten said Dutro, 25, took discipline to an abusive and violent extreme.

She’s accused in the death of her son Zachary Dutro-Boggess, who died a few days after his fourth birthday. In Washington County Circuit Court, she faces charges of murder, murder by abuse and second-degree assault.

Zachary died Aug. 16, 2012. The child was covered in bumps and bruises, Staten said, but he died from two holes in his intestines caused by blunt-force trauma. Urine and feces seeped from the holes and harmed his vital organs.

Staten told jurors the child was sick and his condition was worsening in the hours before 8 a.m. Aug. 14, 2012, when Dutro and her boyfriend, Brian Canady, called for help. By the time an ambulance arrived, the boy was dying, Staten said.

In an interview with detectives, Canady admitted to assaulting the boy two days earlier. Canady told detectives he kicked Zachary in the stomach because the boy had disobeyed. He’d told Zachary to sit and watch TV, he said, but Zachary didn’t listen and went to take his shoes off first.

Canady has since changed his story. He took a plea deal this month, admitting to first-degree manslaughter and second-degree assault. He will testify against Dutro, and if he is consistent with his latest statement to police, he'll be sentenced to 12 and a half years in prison.

Staten indicated Canady took the blame for Dutro when he previously told police about the kick. In his new statement, the prosecutor said, Canady told police that Dutro called him and said she’d given Zachary a “lickin’” for misbehaving.

When the investigation began, Zachary’s 7-year-old sister and 3-year-old brother also showed signs of abuse, Staten said. The 3-year-old boy had multiple fractured ribs. Only Dutro and Canady’s shared biological child, an infant, was reportedly uninjured.

Dutro’s 7-year-old daughter told investigators that she’d seen both Dutro and Canady beating Zachary before he died. Some of her own injuries she attributed to beatings from her mother, Staten said.

Dutro’s abusive history includes violence that occurred before she met Canady, the prosecutor said. She was convicted of assaulting her mother’s foster son in Hawaii, where a judge ordered her to take parenting and anger management classes.

Defense attorney Chris Colburn told the jury Monday morning that Dutro did not hurt her children.

“You’re going to hear, in short, a collection of things about Jessica Dutro and none of them are going to be horribly flattering,” he said. “And you’re going to hear some stuff that references some unusual parenting. But you won’t hear from a single credible source that Jessica Dutro caused serious physical injury or murdered her child.”

Dutro would agree she raised her children in regimented fashion. A “lickin’” to Dutro meant a spanking, Colburn said.

Jurors would see no evidence to support her 7-year-old daughter’s story about Dutro and Canady beating Zachary, he told them.

In August 2012, Canady gave a logical explanation for the boy’s injuries, Colburn told jurors. It fit with the injuries, he said, because it was the true explanation.

A day after the deadly kick, Colburn said, Dutro took Zachary to the shelter cafeteria for dinner. It was Zachary’s birthday and taco night.

He could only take one bite of his tacos. Thinking he might have the flu, Dutro took him back to the room to lie down, Colburn said.

Only Canady knew that the boy was gravely injured, Colburn said. Canady noticed Zachary was “a little wobbly” when the boy got up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom.

But, Colburn said, Canady did nothing about it.

It would be clear who delivered the kick that killed Zachary, he said.

“By the end of this trial, you will have heard no credible evidence that Jessica Dutro assaulted and killed Zachary,” Colburn said.

“We will ask you to find her not guilty of the charges she now faces.”

http://www.oregonlive.com/tigard/index.ssf/2014/03/jessica_dutro_murder_trial_ope.html

Mother ‘beat four-year-old son to death because she thought he was gay’


Saturday 29 Mar 2014 12:45 pm


Jessica Dutro allegedly murdered her son because she thought he was gay (Picture: Washington County Sheriff)
A mother beat her son to death because she thought he was gay, a court has heard.

Jessica Dutro, from Portland, Oregon, allegedly assaulted four-year-old Zachary Dutro-Boggess and two of his siblings over a period of time, which eventually led to his death in August 2012.

The judge in the case allowed the inclusion of a Facebook message sent by Ms Dutro to her boyfriend Brian Canady, in which she expressed concern that her son ‘walked and talked’ as if he might be gay.

Dutro’s boyfriend Brian Canady has agreed to testify against her (Picture: Washington County Sheriff)

She also wrote he had angered her and was ‘facing the wall’ as punishment.

Zachary’s seven-year-old sister said their mother had beaten him until he ‘got dead’, during an interview with police.

Canady, who admitted kicking Zachary in the midriff, has since agreed to testify against his girlfriend as part of a deal with the prosecution for manslaughter. He will no longer face murder charges as a result.

Zachary died of an infection caused by his intestines tearing after he had suffered severe injuries to his abdomen at a homeless shelter his family were staying at.

Dutro and Canady had allegedly waited two days to seek medical help and by that time it was too late.

She faces two murder charges and one of second-degree assault.


http://metro.co.uk/2014/03/29/mother-beat-four-year-old-son-to-death-because-she-thought-he-was-gay-4682496/

Jessica Dutro murder trial: Defense case focuses on boyfriend Brian Canady's abuse of Tigard 4-year-old

Jessica Dutro talks with her defense lawyer Scott Sharp on Tuesday, April 1, 2014. Dutro, 25, is charged in the death of her 4-year-old son, Zachary Dutro-Boggess. (Benjamin Brink/The Oregonian)



on April 01, 2014 at 5:23 PM, updated April 01, 2014 at 10:14 PM
Jessica Dutro’s defense case began Tuesday afternoon in her trial on murder charges in the 2012 death of her 4-year-old son, Zachary Dutro-Boggess.

Prosecutors say Dutro subjected the boy to a pattern of abuse that culminated in a deadly blow. He died Aug. 16, 2012, from intestinal tears caused by blunt-force trauma to his abdomen.

Both Dutro and her boyfriend, Brian Canady, used violence to discipline Zachary and two of his siblings, authorities say. Canady pleaded guilty last month to first-degree manslaughter and second-degree assault for his role in the child’s death.

Defense attorneys have focused their case on Canady's abuse of Zachary.

In early statements to police both Canady and Dutro claimed to know nothing about Zachary’s injuries. Eventually, Canady told detectives he kicked Zachary in the stomach two days before the child was taken to a Portland hospital, where he died.

Though Canady agreed to testify against Dutro and both sides previously expressed interest in calling him as a witness, it appears neither side plans to call him. Dutro's defense case is expected to finish Wednesday.

-- Emily E. Smith


http://www.oregonlive.com/tigard/index.ssf/2014/04/jessica_dutro_murder_trial_def.html

Jessica Dutro convicted of murder after daughter's account of 4-year-old boy's deadly beating

on April 02, 2014 at 7:50 PM, updated April 02, 2014 at 8:47 PM

A young girl witnessed the murder of her brother in a Tigard homeless shelter.

And it was her account that helped convict their mother, 25-year-old Jessica Dutro.

If jurors believed nothing else, prosecutors said Wednesday, they should believe the girl. She watched her mom and her mom's boyfriend fatally beat Zachary Dutro-Boggess Aug. 12, 2012, the day before his 4th birthday.

"They beat up my brother, then he died," the girl told her counselor. "I seen them."

To a Tigard detective, she said, "Jessica and Brian, they kept hitting him and punching him. He didn't listen to them so they kicked him and punched him and stuff and they kept doing it and doing it. ... They knew he were sick and stuff. And they didn't tell anybody."

Washington County jurors took a little more than an hour to reach a unanimous verdict. They found her guilty on all seven counts, including murder, murder by abuse and second-degree assault.

Dutro showed no reaction to the decision, read about 5:15 p.m. Wednesday.

The case drew widespread attention after prosecutors asked the court to allow Facebook messages from Dutro into evidence.

In one message to her boyfriend, Brian Canady, Dutro wrote using a slur that Zachary would be gay. "He walks like it and talks like it ugh," she wrote. That made her angry, she added, and directed Canady to "work on" Zachary "big time."

Prosecutors told the court the message showed Dutro's motive for subjecting Zachary to a pattern of abuse. Judge Don Letourneau deemed the messages admissible.

News of the alleged motive went viral, and the case made national headlines. However, prosecutors didn't focus on the Facebook messages in their arguments to the jury.

The words of Zachary's sister were all jurors would need to find Dutro guilty, Senior Deputy District Attorney Megan Johnson said Wednesday.

But there was other evidence, too.

In closing arguments, Johnson reminded jurors of the photos they'd seen of the children's injuries and medical testimony.

Zachary was dying and could not be saved by the time he received medical care. Forceful, traumatic blows to his abdomen pushed his bowel against his spine, causing two intestinal tears.

When Zachary went to the hospital Aug. 14, 2012, doctors examined his siblings, too. His sister, then 7, and a brother, then 3, were covered in bruises. The boy also had five broken ribs. Only Dutro's infant son was uninjured.

When a doctor told Dutro that Zachary's injuries were the result of a violent assault, Dutro became upset. Angry, she reportedly told the doctor he should have shared his findings sooner.

Johnson recounted the doctor's testimony: Dutro, the doctor noted, said she and Canady had been made to look like idiots. Had they known Zachary's diagnosis before they talked to police, they could have gotten their story straight, she said.

His bowel leaking toxic pre-fecal matter, Zachary suffered extreme pain before his death, Johnson said. As he went into septic shock, he would have struggled to move. The child would not have been eating, walking, talking or acting normally. At one point, he would have been vomiting profusely.

His grave illness would have been obvious, Johnson said, and it was to his sister.

Defense attorneys argued that none of the evidence tied Dutro to the crime.

Canady pleaded guilty last month to first-degree manslaughter and second-degree assault for his role in Zachary's death.

Canady assaulted Zachary when Dutro was not present, defense lawyer Chris Colburn told jurors. She later learned that Canady had "accidentally" kicked the boy. But she saw no signs that Zachary was dying until the moments before she and Canady called for help.

In his closing arguments, Colburn brought up the Facebook messages and addressed Dutro's use of a slur.

What she wrote was meant as a joke, he said. It was offensive, not funny. But, he said, it would be ridiculous to draw a connection between the message and Zachary's death.

-- Emily E. Smith


http://www.oregonlive.com/tigard/index.ssf/2014/04/jessica_dutro_convicted_of_mur.html

How could any woman be this cruel, this evil, let alone a mother, the mother of the poor tortured little boy she murdered?

The so called mother is a cold-blooded murderer and deserves the death penalty. I hope she at least received life in prison. She should not be around children ever.

I'll try to post it when she is sentenced.  She is evil, an evil POS.

She beat her son to death because she thought he might be gay.  I'll bet she's having gay sex before long in prison.  Unless the women beat her to death.