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Thread: Jacob Patrick Sullivan - Pennsylvania

  1. #31
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    Judge denies request to delay trial involving Grace Packer's death

    By Bo Koltnow
    WFMZ Allentown News

    There are new developments in the criminal case against the man charged in the rape and murder of 14-year-old Grace Packer.

    Jacob Sullivan was in a Doylestown court Friday morning arguing to get his trial delayed.

    "Waited a long time for this. A terrible tragedy, no matter who is responsible," Bucks County district attorney Matt Weintraub said.

    Prosecutors said Jacob Sullivan and Sara Packer are the ones responsible for torturing and killing Sara's 14-year-old adopted daughter Grace.

    Sullivan asked the judge Friday to delay his upcoming capital murder trial.

    His defense argued two pending death penalty cases in front of Pennsylvania's Supreme Court are grounds for postponement.

    However, the D.A. argued it's been two years since Sullivan was charged, and they shouldn't be asked to play the waiting game for a guessing game.

    The judge agreed and said the trial will go on as planned.

    "I'm pleased about that. We've had this date for a while and we are looking forward to just getting in there and letting a judge or jury decide what should happen in this case," Weintraub added.

    Prosecutors said Sullivan and Packer raped, strangled and beat Grace inside a Richland Township home back in 2016.

    Her dismembered remains were found by hunters months later in the Poconos. Prosecutors have said it was part of a rape-murder fantasy Sullivan and Packer had.

    The judge ruled Friday on several contested autopsy and scene photos set to be used in trial. She allowed some, but deemed others too graphic for the jury.

    "Why are pictures so important?" WFMZ News' Bo Koltnow asked Weintraub.

    "Because you have to show how Grace's remains were left. I think it's important for the fact finder not only be told but to see it for themselves," Weintraub said.

    Sullivan is set for trial March 14, with Sara Packer to follow.

    http://www.wfmz.com/news/lehigh-vall...eath/980876694
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

  2. #32
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    Jacob Sullivan's attorneys claim Sara Packer masterminded 14-year-old Grace Packer's rape and murder

    By Laurie Mason Schroeder
    Allentown Morning Call

    Attorneys for Jacob Sullivan, who is charged with the rape and murder of 14-year-old Grace Packer, said they will use Children and Youth records and other documents to show that Grace’s adoptive mother, Sara Packer, was the mastermind behind the killing.

    “There was a contentious, at best, relationship between Sara Packer and Grace Packer,” Senior Deputy Public Defender Jack Fagan told Judge Diane Gibbons during a pretrial hearing for Sullivan in Bucks County Court on Wednesday.

    A jury next month will be asked to determine what happened to Grace, a former Allentown student whose dismembered body was found by hunters in Luzerne County on Halloween 2016. Prosecutors say Sullivan and his girlfriend, Sara Packer, a former Northampton County adoption supervisor, planned and carried out the crime in July 2016 in a home they rented on East Cherry Road in Richland Township.

    Police say Grace was bound, gagged, drugged and left in a hot closet overnight to die. When the couple found the teen alive the next day, Sullivan strangled her, police say.

    Sullivan, 46, allegedly confessed to the killing and implicated Packer, 44. He’s now contesting that confession, saying he was delusional.

    In court Wednesday, Sullivan’s lawyers said they had examined two boxes of Children and Youth records. Caseworkers in numerous counties were involved with Grace, who went into foster care when she was 2 years old.

    When Grace was 4, Sara Packer and her former husband, David Packer, adopted her and her younger brother, in 2006. Within a year, Grace was sexually assaulted by David Packer, who pleaded guilty in 2011 to sexually abusing her and another girl — one of at least 30 foster children the couple had in the Allentown home over several years, authorities said.

    David Packer served 18 months to five years in prison and registered as a sex offender under Megan’s Law. Sara Packer was not charged then, but Lehigh County Children and Youth started supervising the family, court records say.

    Defense attorneys told the judge they also may refer to the state-mandated Fatality Review Report on Grace’s death. Gibbons is permitting the lawyers to view the still-sealed report in her chambers.

    Fagan said the report, along with the Children and Youth records, will further the defense’s theory that Sara Packer plotted the killing.

    “It goes toward the relationship between Sara Packer and Grace Packer,” he said.

    Packer and Sullivan were arrested in January 2017 after surviving a suicide attempt. Police say they tried to kill themselves with pills, but were found by a housemate who called an ambulance.

    Packer and Sullivan are each charged with homicide, rape, conspiracy, kidnapping and abuse of corpse. They are being tried separately, with Sullivan’s case going first.

    Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Sullivan, and say they have not ruled it out for Sara Packer.

    Jury selection on Feb. 19 is expected to last two weeks or more, with opening statements and testimony set for March 14.

    https://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/...206-story.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

  3. #33
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    Will Grace Packer case put child welfare system on trial?

    By Laurie Mason Schroeder
    Allentown Morning Call

    As the story of Grace Packer’s short life and horrific death plays out in a Bucks County courtroom in the coming weeks, jurors will be focused on Sara Packer and Jacob Sullivan, the two people accused in the 14-year-old’s rape and murder.
    As the evidence is laid out against the couple, details of Grace’s life as a foster child, then an unwanted adopted daughter, may also be revealed.

    The details could effectively put Pennsylvania’s child welfare system on trial.

    “Clearly, it will fill in some pieces of the puzzle,” said Cathleen Palm, founder of the Center for Children's Justice, a child advocacy agency in Berks County. “After the trial is over, it will be one of those times that we should take a step back and ask what went wrong.”

    Jury selection begins Tuesday and is expected to last two weeks or more, with opening statements and testimony set for March 14. Defense attorneys plan to use records from various child welfare agencies that were supposed to be overseeing Grace, potentially exposing red flags that went unheeded.

    Lessons learned from the trial could lead to changes in the state’s child protection policies, experts say.

    Aside from the gruesome allegations of Grace’s death, one reason child advocates will be watching Packer and Sullivan’s trial so closely is that so many agencies were involved in her care.

    Born in 2001 to parents who suffered from mental illness, Grace was placed in foster care by age 3, amid allegations of abuse and neglect in her home. A Berks County judge terminated Rose and Rodney Hunsicker’s parental rights in 2006, clearing the way for Sara Packer and her then-husband David Packer to adopt Grace — then named Susan Hunsicker — in 2007.

    Sara Packer was an adoption supervisor with Northampton County’s Children, Youth and Families Division, and she and David Packer fostered at least 30 children in their Allentown home until David Packer was convicted of sexually abusing Grace and another foster daughter in 2011.

    David Packer’s crime prompted an investigation by Lehigh County Children and Youth, but Grace remained with her adoptive mother, who later moved with Sullivan to Montgomery County, and then Richland Township, Bucks County, where Grace was allegedly murdered.

    After Grace’s death, several of her former foster siblings claimed that they reported abuse in the home years before. Jessica Rotellini Law, who was 16 when she lived with the Packers in 2006, said she told her caseworker that 6-year-old Grace was being forced to clean up dog feces.

    And records uncovered by The Morning Call showed that the state Welfare Department’s regional Office of Children Youth and Families in Scranton investigated a report that David Packer physically abused Grace in 2008, three years before he pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting her, but no charges were filed.

    After Packer and Sullivan were arrested, prosecutors said the couple expressed “hatred” toward Grace.

    For Richard Wexler, executive director of National Coalition for Child Protection Reform, the potential missteps in Grace’s case began while she was still living with the Hunsickers. Too often, Wexler said, child protection agencies equate a family’s poverty with neglect.

    “The underlying tragedy is that she was taken from her birth parents in the first place,” Wexler said. “One is left to wonder why there wasn’t more of an effort made to fix the family’s problems, instead of destroying the family.”

    The Hunsickers are expected to attend the trial and read victim impact statements if Packer and Sullivan are convicted and sentenced.

    Lessons learned

    Palm cautioned that even if the trial reveals unheeded red flags, critics should remember that child welfare policies have changed over the past decade.

    “When we hear that something happened we should ask, ‘could that happen today?’ Things that are known in 2019 probably weren’t known ten years ago,” Palm said.

    The strict privacy rules meant to protect children in foster care mean that criminal trials are one of the few places that the public can learn about the inner workings of that system. Sometimes, the lessons learned at a trial can change child welfare for the better, Wexler said.

    He pointed to the 2002 case of 5-year-old Logan Marr, who was taken away from her teenage birth mother when she was an infant and later died in a Maine foster home.

    Like Sara Packer, Marr’s foster mother, Sally Ann Schofield, worked in child welfare as a child protective service caseworker — a violation of that state’s rule. Schofield was convicted of manslaughter for wrapping Marr in 47 feet of duct tape and leaving her alone in her high chair as punishment.

    Some of the tape covered Marr’s mouth, and she suffocated.

    Public outcry over Marr’s death led to changes in Maine’s foster care system, including a requirement that child protection workers must first look for relatives to place children with before putting them in other foster homes. Pennsylvania has a similar rule.

    Closer to home, the 2012 child sexual assault trial of former Penn State assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky brought attention to Pennsylvania’s child welfare system, though advocates disagree on whether the resulting changes have helped or hurt children. While more people are aware of child abuse and reports have soared, child protection workers have struggled to keep up with the deluge of reports.

    “[Children and Youth] agencies have been drowning in paperwork and staff turnover, so their primary mission of protecting children has been lost in the frantic rush just to survive each day,” state Auditor General Eugene DePasquale said in a 2017 report.

    Wexler said he hopes Grace’s case prompts child protection agencies to rethink their policies.

    “I hope we come to an understanding that states and localities must be less prone to a ‘take the child and run’ approach to child welfare,” he said.

    The defense theory

    It’s likely that very little about Grace’s home life will be revealed in the first weeks of the trial. Sullivan and Packer are being tried separately in Bucks County Court, with Sullivan’s case going first.

    District Attorney Matt Weintraub and Chief Deputy District Attorney Jennifer Schorn must first prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Sullivan and Packer plotted together to rape and kill Grace. Weintraub has said the slaying was the culmination of a rape and murder fantasy the couple shared.

    Details about the Packer home likely will come out during the defense portion of Sullivan’s case. His attorneys have requested access to dozens of Children and Youth records, as well as a state-mandated review of Grace’s death.

    The records, which are generally closed to the public, are being used to further the defense theory that Packer masterminded the crime, Sullivan’s attorney, Jack Fagan, said at a pretrial hearing this month.

    “There was a contentious, at best, relationship between Sara Packer and Grace Packer,” Senior Deputy Public Defender Jack Fagan told Judge Diane Gibbons.

    Packer and Sullivan are each charged with homicide, rape, conspiracy, kidnapping and abuse of corpse. They are being held without bail in the Bucks County Jail.

    Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Sullivan, and say they have not ruled it out for Sara Packer.

    https://www.mcall.com/news/police/mc...208-story.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

  4. #34
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    Jacob Sullivan pleads guilty in Grace Packer murder, may face death; Sara Packer will also plead guilty

    By Laurie Mason Schroeder

    Allentown Morning Call

    In two stunning moves today, Jacob Sullivan pleaded guilty to first-degree murder in the killing of 14-year-old Grace Packer, while officials said Grace’s adoptive mother, Sara Packer, will also plead guilty and serve a life sentence for her daughter’s slaying.

    A jury will now be seated to determine whether Sullivan should get the death penalty, or serve life in prison for the 2016 killing. Sara Packer, 44, is expected to testify in the penalty phase of Sullivan’s trial.

    Packer, who was expected to go to trial next month, “has been cooperating with commonwealth for a substantial period of time now,” Packer’s defense attorney, Keith Williams, said outside the courtroom.

    “She will continue to do so until this case for Mr. Sullivan is completed,” Williams said. “After that we expect she will enter her own guilty plea and be sentenced to life plus whatever additional sentence the judge imposes. That’s all I can say.”

    Sullivan’s plea answers some questions about what happened to Grace, a former Allentown student whose dismembered body was found by hunters in Luzerne County on Halloween 2016.

    Prosecutors say Sullivan, 46, of Horsham and his girlfriend, Packer, a former Northampton County adoption supervisor, raped and murdered Grace in July 2016 in a home they rented on East Cherry Road in Richland Township, near Quakertown.

    Police say Grace was bound with zip ties, gagged with a ball gag, drugged and left in a hot closet overnight to die. When the couple found the teen alive the next day, Sullivan strangled her, police say.

    Sullivan and Packer were arrested in Jan. 2017, after a failed suicide pact. Sullivan allegedly confessed to the killing and implicated Packer. He later recanted that confession, saying he was delusional.

    The next step in the case is the penalty phase. Jurors will hear details of the crime, as well as information about Sullivan’s life.

    His attorneys have also sought access to sealed Children and Youth records, which they hope to use to show that Sara Packer was the mastermind of the crime. Jurors may hear information about Grace’s life in foster care, as well as the results of a state-mandated report on Grace’s death, which has not yet been made public.

    This story has been changed to reflect that remarks outside the courtroom were made by Sara Packer’s defense attorney, Keith Williams, and not District Attorney Matthew Weintraub.

    https://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/...215-story.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

  5. #35
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    Jacob Sullivan's guilty plea hearing in Grace Packer murder starts again...and he goes back to hospital again

    By Laurie Mason Schroeder
    Allentown Morning Call

    After more than a full day’s delay due to a medical emergency and winter storm, Jacob Sullivan’s guilty plea hearing in the rape and murder of 14-year-old Grace Packer started up again in Bucks County Court on Thursday, only to be suddenly halted once again when Sullivan’s blood pressure spiked and he had to be rushed by ambulance to a hospital.

    Though Sullivan has already admitted that he raped and killed the former Allentown girl, Judge Diane Gibbons must complete the hearing and accept his plea before a jury can be seated to determine if Sullivan should face the death penalty or life in prison.

    Sullivan, 46, was rushed to Doylestown Hospital by ambulance Tuesday, several hours into his plea hearing, prompting the judge to postpone the proceeding. After Wednesday’s snow storm closed the courthouse, the case was set for Thursday morning.

    Gibbons spent more than an hour Thursday explaining Sullivan’s rights to him before taking a brief recess. During the recess, Sullivan complained of a headache and asked for aspirin. The sheriff’s office called an ambulance as a precaution, and rescue squad members found that Sullivan’s blood pressure was 220/140 — an extremely high reading, Gibbons said.
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    The judge noted that Sullivan did take his prescribed high blood pressure medication Thursday before court. On Tuesday, his lawyers said jail staff had failed to give it to him.

    Sullivan has a “lifelong” problem with his blood pressure and has family members who have died from blood pressure-related illness, the judge noted.

    On Tuesday, the former Horsham man admitted that he and Sara Packer, the teen’s adoptive mother, conspired together to kill Grace as part of a sexual fantasy, then carried out the crime in a rented Richland Township home in the summer of 2016.

    Judge Gibbons had listened to hours of testimony in the case, and was in the midst of questioning Sullivan when his lawyers suddenly asked for a recess. Public defender Christina King told the judge that jail staff had not given Sullivan his blood pressure medication before court, causing his condition to spike during the hearing.

    On Tuesday, prosecutors revealed that Packer has been cooperating with them and has reached a plea deal to avoid the death penalty. Her attorney, Keith Williams, said he expects her to plead guilty after Sullivan’s case is complete and be sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole.

    Sullivan’s attorneys said they will tell the jury about Packer’s deal as part of their argument against a death sentence for Sullivan. Packer may also testify.

    Sullivan pleaded guilty to 18 crimes, including first-degree murder, rape of a child, kidnapping and abuse of a corpse. Jurors will be selected for the penalty phase during the next two to three weeks, then will return to the courthouse March 14 to begin.

    Prosecutors say Sullivan and Packer, a former Northampton County adoption supervisor, concealed Grace’s body in kitty litter for four months then sawed off her limbs before discarding her body in rural Luzerne County. Hunters found the remains on Halloween 2016.
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    The couple was arrested following a failed suicide pact in 2017. Both remain in jail without bail.

    https://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/...220-story.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

  6. #36
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    With nurse in courtroom, judge accepts Jacob Sullivan's guilty plea in rape and murder of Grace Packer

    By Laurie Mason Schroeder
    Allentown Morning Call

    With a nurse standing by in the courtroom, Jacob Sullivan finally completed his guilty plea Friday in the rape and murder of 14-year-old Grace Packer.

    Sighing heavily several times, the 46-year-old father of four listened as Bucks County Judge Diane Gibbons spent three hours explaining the plea process and advising Sullivan of his appeal rights. He then answered “yes” repeatedly as the judge asked him to confirm that he committed more than a dozen crimes, including first-degree murder, rape of a child, kidnapping and abuse of corpse.

    The plea hearing ended 75 hours after it started, because Sullivan was twice taken to a hospital when his blood pressure spiked during the proceedings. Jury selection for the penalty phase is underway, as attorneys search for 12 people to decide whether Sullivan should be sentenced to life in prison, or the death penalty.

    Sullivan initially took ill Tuesday, after he admitted that he killed Grace in 2016 with the help of her adoptive mother, Sara Packer. After a further delay caused by Wednesday’s snowstorm, the hearing resumed Thursday and Sullivan once again felt sick.
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    Gibbons postponed the rest of the hearing until Friday. This time, she was able to finish the proceeding and said she was satisfied that Sullivan entered his plea knowingly, willingly and intelligently, as required by law.

    Jurors will be selected over the next week or two, and will return to the courthouse in Doylestown on March 14 for the penalty phase.

    Sara Packer, who is Sullivan’s girlfriend, also is expected to plead guilty to rape and murder.

    In court Friday, prosecutors again read aloud details of the gruesome crime:

    Sullivan admitted that he and Sara Packer, a former Northampton County adoption supervisor, plotted for nearly a year to rape and murder Grace as part of a sexual fantasy they shared.

    Chief Deputy District Attorney Jennifer Schorn said the couple woke Grace up on July 8, 2016, and told her they were taking her to a home they rented in Richland Township because she was wanted by police for posting naked photos online. The family was living in an Abington apartment at the time and preparing to move to Bucks County.

    Family friends previously said Grace was not permitted to use social media, but did anyway and was reprimanded.

    Schorn said Sullivan punched Grace in the face, then raped her while her mother watched. Sullivan and Sara Packer then hog-tied Grace with zip ties, drugged her with over-the-counter sleep medication, gagged her and left her in a hot attic closet to die.

    As part of his guilty plea, Sullivan admitted that he strangled Grace when the couple came back to the Richland home the next day and found that she was still alive.
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    According to Sullivan’s statement, he and Sara Packer hid Grace’s body in kitty litter in their attic for four months before dismembering it and tossing the body parts along a road in Luzerne County, where hunters discovered them on Halloween 2016.

    Schorn said that Sullivan’s credit card statements included purchases for zip ties and kitty litter the week of the slaying.

    Sara Packer and Sullivan were arrested in January 2017 after a failed suicide pact in which they both tried to overdose on pills.

    Prosecutors revealed on Tuesday that Sara Packer has been cooperating with them and was granted a plea deal to avoid the death penalty. Bucks County District Attorney Matt Weintraub said jurors will learn during Sullivan’s penalty phase more about why his office offered Sara Packer a deal.

    Defense attorneys plan to argue that Sullivan should also be sentenced to life. They may call Sara Packer as a witness.

    As jury selection started Friday afternoon, Weintraub told potential jurors that they would hear “gruesome” facts. He called Sara Packer “evil,” but warned the jury that they would have to put their feelings about her plea deal aside when deciding Sullivan’s fate.

    “It’s our theory Sara Packer participated every step of the way, if not more, than the defendant,” Weintraub said. “But it’s not your job to determine if her sentence was just.”

    https://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/...221-story.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Jacob Sullivan's lawyers say Sara Packer 'manipulated' him into murdering her adoptive daughter, Grace

    By Laurie Mason Schroeder
    Allentown Morning Call

    With the death penalty looming for Jacob Sullivan in the rape and murder of 14-year-old Grace Packer, his lawyers intend to show that he was dominated by Grace’s adoptive mother, Sara Packer, whom they contend had a history of sexually abusing children.

    In a Bucks County courtroom on Friday, Sullivan’s lawyers said they will present evidence at his upcoming sentencing hearing that Packer “groomed” Sullivan to sexually assault Grace, and that she had abused other children, including having three-way sex with her then-husband and an underage foster child in Allentown at least twice.

    They also plan to call a man who claims that during a Facebook chat, Sara Packer offered to find him a virgin to have sex with. Prosecutors say the defense misconstrued the conversation.

    Prosecutors tried to keep the defense from presenting evidence against Packer, who also is charged with the murder. What she did before meeting Sullivan isn’t relevant now that he has pleaded guilty to first-degree murder, rape and other charges, they said.

    But Judge Diane E. Gibbons sided with the defense, agreeing that they can use the information to make their case that Sullivan should be spared the death penalty because he was under the “substantial domination” of Packer when he committed the crime.

    “He met a person who was already engaged in the sexual abuse of children. I don’t see how that’s not relevant,” the judge said.

    Had the case gone to trial, Sullivan’s lawyers would not have been permitted to bring up Packer’s past. But, the judge noted, when the question of life or death is on the table, the law is more lenient about what can be presented.

    Sullivan, 46, admitted last month that he and Packer brought Grace to a Richland Township home they were renting in July 2016 and attacked her. Prosecutors said the couple was carrying out a shared rape-and-murder fantasy.

    Sullivan raped Grace while Packer watched, he admitted, then the pair drugged Grace and left her to die in a hot attic. Finding Grace still alive the next day, Sullivan strangled her, he admitted.

    They later dismembered Grace’s body and tossed the pieces along a country road in Luzerne County, where they were found by hunters in October 2016.

    Packer, 44, has struck a deal to plead guilty to first-degree murder and serve life in prison with no chance of parole.

    Sullivan’s lawyers argue that he should get the same sentence, saying Packer was the “brains” and “mastermind” of the crime.
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    “She had a dominant personality and he’s an individual who can be easily manipulated,” said Jack Fagan, Sullivan’s attorney. “He’s a follower.”

    Sullivan met Sara Packer in 2013, while her husband was in jail.

    Sara and David Packer had no children of their own but adopted Grace and her younger brother in 2007, when Sara was working as an adoption supervisor with Northampton County’s Children, Youth and Families Division. Over the years, the couple fostered at least 30 children in Allentown. That ended in 2010, when David Packer was charged with sexually abusing Grace when she was about 5 years old, and an older foster daughter. A day after the allegations surfaced, Sara Packer was suspended and then terminated from her job for “misconduct,” though the county declined to provide details. In 2011, David Packer was convicted in the cases.

    Sara Packer was not charged then but her name was placed on Childline, a clearinghouse of people involved in abuse cases. She maintained custody of her two adopted children.

    Fagan, Sullivan’s attorney, did not say that Sara Packer knew her husband had sexually assaulted Grace. But he said he will call witnesses, including the foster daughter David Packer abused and a Lehigh County detective, to show that Sara Packer knew children were being sexually abused in the home.

    Fagan said the testimony will show that Sara Packer “groomed David Packer and advised him how to make [a foster child] want to have sex with him,” then participated in sex with her husband and a foster daughter at least twice. Fagan did not say how old the child was.

    David Packer was paroled in 2015. He filed for divorce a month before Grace was murdered.

    Sullivan’s lawyers say they will show that Sara Packer emotionally abused Grace for years, and that she had remarked to a fellow inmate about Grace, saying, “ding dong the witch is dead.”

    Both Sullivan and Packer remain behind bars without bail. Sullivan’s sentencing hearing will begin next Friday. Packer is expected to plead guilty after that proceeding, said her attorney, Keith Williams.

    https://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/...308-story.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

  8. #38
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    Based on the information we have so far, the Commonwealth gave the plea deal to the wrong person. The mother is a monster, and unless the Commonwealth adduces evidence that this guy is more blameworthy than the mother, it's a travesty that she got a deal.

  9. #39
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    Jurors asked to imagine horrors 14-year-old Grace Packer endured

    By Laurie Mason Schroeder
    Allentown Morning Call

    In his opening statement to the jury at Jacob Sullivan’s sentencing hearing Friday, Bucks County District Attorney Matt Weintraub asked jurors to imagine themselves in 14-year-old Grace Packer’s place during her last 12 hours alive; gagged and hogtied in a dark and sweltering attic, fighting to free herself from the zip ties binding her wrists and ankles.

    “She is thinking, will she live, will she die? Will she be murdered,” Weintraub said. “So she fought to break the ties that bound her. She was fighting for her very life.”

    Weintraub, who is asking the jury to sentence Sullivan to death, said Grace managed to wriggle out of some of the zip ties and had spit the gag out of her mouth by the time Sullivan returned to the attic with Sara Packer, his girlfriend and Grace’s adoptive mother.

    So Sullivan strangled her.

    “Her reward for breaking her bounds...was death,” Weintraub said.

    It was a dramatic start to a two-week hearing that will end with jurors being asked to choose between life in prison or the death penalty for Sullivan.

    His attorneys say a life sentence is fair, because that’s what Sara Packer will serve. They also say Packer “dominated” Sullivan, and used her “magnetic personality” to convince him to rape Grace.

    “The mother of this child was involved in every part of this. That should carry weight. That should carry great weight,” defense attorney Jack Fagan said.

    Sullivan pleaded guilty last month to first-degree murder, rape of a child, kidnapping, abuse of a corpse and other crimes.

    He admitted that he and Packer brought Grace to a Richland Township home they were renting in July 2016 and attacked her to fulfill a rape-and-murder fantasy they shared.

    While Sara Packer watched, Sullivan punched Grace in the face, then ripped off her pajamas and raped her. After the assault the couple fed the teen over the counter sleep medication before tying her up and leaving her to die in the attic, Sullivan admitted.

    After strangling Grace, Sullivan admitted that he and Packer hid her body in a box filled with kitty litter in the attic for months.

    Abington police detective Cindy Pettinato was the prosecution’s first witness Friday. She testified that Sara Packer reported Grace missing three days after the rape, saying Grace stole $300 and ran away.

    Pettinato told the jury that Packer promised to drop off a photograph of Grace to aid in the search, but never did. Unable to get Packer to return a phone call, Pettinato drove out to the Abington address Packer had given her, only to find the home vacant.

    The detective testified that she stood in the driveway of the home and called Sara Packer’s cell phone, leaving a “not very nice message.” She said she demanded to know why Packer was dodging her calls, and why she hadn’t informed police that she was moving.

    “And how was her daughter going to find her?” she said.

    Pettinato testified that Packer finally called her back after that message, claiming that she’d been forced to move suddenly. Still suspicious, Pettinato visited Packer’s new home in Quakertown several weeks later, and asked to see Grace’s bedroom.

    Prosecutors say that visit spooked Sullivan and Packer enough that they decided to get rid of Grace’s body. After cutting offer her limbs, Sullivan admitted, they drove Grace’s body to Luzerne County where they poured drain cleaner over her face and left her in a wooded area.

    Fagan told jurors that the drain cleaner was Sara Packer’s idea.

    Weintraub told the jury that Sullivan deserves capital punishment for what he did to Grace while she was alive, and after her death.

    “This defendant treated 14-year-old Grace as a disposable child,” Weintraub said. “He did what he wanted with her, when he wanted, and then he ultimately crumpled her up and threw her on the side of the road like trash.”

    The hearing is ongoing.

    Five things to know about Jacob Sullivan’s sentencing hearing

    Jacob Sullivan’s sentencing hearing in the rape and murder of 14-year-old Grace Packer begins today in Bucks County Court in Doylestown. Here’s what you need to know:

    1. Jurors have one question before them — life or death for Sullivan.

    Sullivan, 46, pleaded guilty last month to first-degree murder and other counts. He admitted last month that he and his girlfriend, Sara Packer, Grace’s adoptive mother, brought Grace to a Richland Township home they were renting in July 2016 and attacked her. Prosecutors said the couple was carrying out a shared rape-and-murder fantasy . Judge Diane Gibbons has already ruled on the most “disturbing” crime scene photos.

    2. The penalty phase could take two weeks or more.

    Jurors will see a streamlined version of the prosecution’s case against Sullivan, then will hear lengthy evidence from the defense aimed at swaying them toward a life sentence.

    3. Sara Packer could testify.

    The defense is arguing that Sullivan should get the same sentence as Packer, 44, who cut a deal with prosecutors to serve life in exchange for her guilty plea. The defense is also blaming her for being the “mastermind” of Grace’s murder.

    4. Jurors could hear gruesome evidence.

    Sullivan has admitted that he raped Grace while Packer watched, then the pair drugged Grace and left her to die in a hot attic. Finding Grace still alive the next day, Sullivan strangled her, he admitted. He further admitted that he and Packer dismembered Grace’s body and tossed the pieces along a country road in Luzerne County, where they were found by hunters in October 2016.

    5. A death verdict must be unanimous.

    If one juror wants to spare Sullivan the death penalty, then the sentence will be life. All 12 jurors must vote for death for Sullivan to get capital punishment.

    https://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/...311-story.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

  10. #40
    Administrator Helen's Avatar
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    Sullivan's confession: Grace looked to mom for help during rape

    By Laurie Mason Schroeder
    Allentown Morning Call

    Jacob Sullivan started his rape of Grace Packer by punching the 14-year-old girl in the face and ripping her pajama shirt. Crying, her mouth bloodied, Grace turned toward her adoptive mother, Sara Packer, and pleaded for help.

    Packer just watched as the attack continued.

    “She wanted Grace to see that she wasn’t going to save her. She got off on that,” Sullivan told a detective. “I did too, to tell you the truth.”

    When it was time to strangle Grace, Sullivan said he tried to soothe the frightened teen, who was fighting against his choke hold despite the zip ties he and Packer had used to restrain her.

    “Just go, honey, just go,” Sullivan recalled telling Grace. “It’s okay honey, it’s time to go.”

    A Bucks County jury on Tuesday heard several hours of Sullivan’s taped confession, which he made while still hospitalized for a failed suicide attempt just before he and Packer were arrested for Grace’s rape and murder. The panel will determine whether Sullivan is sentenced to life in prison or the death penalty.

    Sullivan, 46, pleaded guilty last month to 18 crimes, including first-degree murder, rape of a child and kidnapping. As part of a plea deal, Sara Packer will avoid the death penalty and be sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole.

    Packer, 44, is scheduled to testify for the defense Wednesday. Sullivan’s attorneys say she “groomed” Sullivan to rape Grace and are arguing that he should serve the same sentence she does.

    Prosecutors say Sullivan, who spent several days in intensive care at Abington Memorial Hospital after swallowing handfuls of pills, first confessed to hospital staff that he murdered Grace, then talked to detectives from his hospital bed.

    During the rambling Jan. 7, 2017 interview, Sullivan gave detectives details about how and where he and Packer dismembered and dumped Grace’s body, and described the rape and murder in excruciating detail.

    Sullivan said he and Packer convinced Grace, who suffered from emotional problems from being sexually molested by Sara Packer’s ex-husband, David Packer, that police were searching for her because of inappropriate social media posts.

    Sullivan told the detectives that he and Packer believed they had given Grace a fatal dose of sleep medication after the July 8, 2016 rape, and fully expected to find her dead when they returned 12 hours later to the Richland Township rental home the used for the attack.

    Despite the drugs and extreme heat in the attic, Grace was still alive, and had wriggled out of some of the zip ties binding her. On the tape, Sullivan was heard complaining to detectives that Grace was harder to strangle than he expected.

    “It took a really long time,” he said, chuckling at times. “It was extraordinarily physical for me. It was a fight kind of thing.”

    Sullivan told the detectives that raping someone was a longtime fantasy he had, one which Sara Packer wanted to see him act out on Grace, who was rebellious.

    “She was really mad at Grace. It was a ‘I can finally control you’ type of thing,” Sullivan said.

    The hearing is ongoing.

    https://www.mcall.com/news/breaking/...312-story.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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