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  1. #1
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    Gary Lee Fellenbaum Sentenced to LWOP in 2014 PA Beating and Torture Death of 3-year-old Scott McMillan

    ***WARNING- The details surrounding the toddler's death are extremely disturbing***


    Three-year-old Scott McMillan




    Amber Fellenbaum, who lived in the home with their 11-month-old child,
    has been charged with child endangerment for not calling police.



    3-year-old hung by feet, ‘tortured and beaten to death’


    WEST CALN TOWNSHIP, Pa. — Police say a man and his girlfriend are charged with brutally murdering the woman’s 3-year-old son.

    Gary Fellenbaum and Jillian Tait were arrested Thursday morning.

    On Tuesday, authorities were called to their residence on a report of an unresponsive child. EMTs found 3-year-old Scott McMillan suffering from bruises, lacerations and puncture wounds all over his body, according to WPVI.

    Fellenbaum, Tait and another witness confessed that the boy had been beaten with blunt and sharp objects, whipped, taped to a chair with electrical tape and beaten. He was then hung up by his feet and beaten again, which lead to his death.

    According to police, they beat the boy to death using homemade weapons like a whip, a curtain rod and an aluminum strip.

    Tait told police the beating began when the boy wouldn’t eat his breakfast.

    “Little Scotty McMillan is dead,” Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan said. “Over a three day period … he was systematically tortured and beaten to death. He was punched in the face and in the stomach. He was scourged with a homemade whip. He was lashed with a metal rod. He was tied to a chair and beaten. He was tied upside down by his feet and beaten. His head was smashed through a wall.”

    Tait said Fellenbaum routinely beat her 6 and 3-year-old boys. On one occasion, she said he strung the boys up by their feet and beat them while she and Fellenbaum laughed.

    The 6-year-old boy is now in the care of relatives.

    Fellenbaum and Tait are both charged with murder and Hogan said he will be seeking the death penalty.

    Law enforcement veterans told WPVI that they had never seen a child abuse murder case like this one.

    http://fox8.com/2014/11/06/3-year-ol...aten-to-death/
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    Yes, I just read about this. Here is another article:

    2 charged in death of boy hung by feet, beaten

    A Pennsylvania couple went car shopping, bought pizza and took a nap as the woman's unresponsive 3-year-old son lay dying after weeks of escalating abuse that ended in three days of systematic torture, officials said Thursday.

    Jillian Tait, 31, and Gary Lee Fellenbaum, 23, were charged Thursday with murder in the death of Tait's son, Scott McMillan, and aggravated assault in the beating of his older brother.

    They are accused of laughing as Scott was hung upside down and whipped, striking him repeatedly with a frying pan, and eventually beating him to death.

    Chester County District Attorney Thomas Hogan called the case "an American horror story."

    "It was an unspeakable act of depravity," he said.

    Noting that investigators found no evidence that drugs or alcohol had been involved, he said: "This is just evilness."

    The couple met working at Wal-Mart and last month moved in together, along with Fellenbaum's estranged wife and three children — Tait's 6- and 3-year-old sons and the Fellenbaums' 11-month-old daughter. The six lived in a mobile home park outside the city of Coatesville, about 35 miles northwest of Philadelphia.

    The prosecutor said what started as spankings morphed into "concentrated, repeated, escalating abuse." Then, "over three days he was systematically tortured and beaten to death," Hogan said.

    The prosecutor said late Thursday he had not yet been notified of the couple having obtained lawyers.

    The three adults told authorities "that Scott McMillan had been punched and beaten with blunt and sharp objects, whipped, taped to a chair with electrical tape and beaten, hung up by his feet and beaten, and suffered other acts of violence," police said in affidavits released Thursday.

    "During one incident," the affidavits say, "Gary hung Scott and (his older brother) up by their feet one at a time and beat the boys while they were hanging upside down. Jillian stated that she and Gary were laughing during the incident."

    Hogan said the older brother apparently knew that if he struggled while being hung from the back of a door, it would only get worse. But his younger brother squirmed and struggled, he said.

    "They thought that was funny," he said.

    Fellenbaum's 21-year-old estranged wife, Amber Fellenbaum, was charged with child endangerment for allegedly failing to help the toddler. She ultimately called 911 Tuesday night, authorities said. By then, Scott had been unresponsive for hours and had been put in a shower for more than 30 minutes by his mother and her boyfriend, investigators said. When the boy failed to awaken, they placed him on an uninflated air mattress and went shopping, authorities said.

    Gary Fellenbaum severely beat the boy for refusing to eat toast both Monday and Tuesday morning, authorities said. The "discipline" included throwing him against a wall, knocking him off a chair with a punch and then taping him to the chair to keep him upright for more beatings, police said.

    Tait said Fellenbaum had thrown the boy against the wall so hard, it "caused a hole in the wall," according to the statement she gave police.

    She told police that she took part in the abuse and saw the scars on her younger son, court documents said.

    Police said her older son also showed signs of abuse.

    "It is going to take us years to put him back together again physically and mentally," Hogan said.

    There was no evidence the infant was harmed, authorities said. She and the 6-year-old were placed in the custody of relatives, the prosecutor said.

    Tait and Fellenbaum were being held without bail after their arraignments Thursday. They are scheduled for a preliminary hearing Nov. 14.

    http://news.yahoo.com/2-charged-deat...181829720.html

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    There is a pic of Casey Anthony on his facebook page.

    https://www.facebook.com/gary.fellenbaum
    "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."
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    "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.”
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    Mother doesn't believe her son beat boy to death

    The mother of a man accused of striking his girlfriend's 3-year-old with a frying pan, hanging him upside down and hitting him, and whipping him with a metal rod said Friday that her son is a good kid and she doesn't believe he beat the boy to death.

    "I believe he's being railroaded," Paula Fellenbaum said outside her parents' home in central Pennsylvania. "He liked kids. He never had an issue. I don't understand it at all."

    Yet authorities said her 23-year-old son, Gary Fellenbaum, and Jillian Tait both acknowledged repeatedly hitting Tait's young child in a mobile home outside Coatesville, about 35 miles northwest of Philadelphia. Both face murder charges.

    The Chester County district attorney described the case as "an American horror story," saying weeks of escalating abuse ended in three days of systematic torture.

    Fellenbaum severely beat Scott McMillan for refusing to eat toast both Monday and Tuesday morning, authorities said. The "discipline" included throwing him against a wall, knocking him off a chair with a punch and then taping him to the chair to keep him upright for more beatings, police said.

    As Scott lay dying Tuesday, officials say, the couple went car shopping, picked up a pizza and then took a nap. Fellenbaum later "expressed remorse" for Scott's death, police said.

    The victim's father, Loren McMillan, has been living out of state but is traveling back to the area, according to officials and relatives.

    Loren McMillan's sister, Tera Kluxen, said Friday her family had no idea the boy was in danger. They now want custody of Scott's 6-year-old brother, who authorities say also showed signs of abuse and was placed with unspecified other relatives.

    "We're going to do everything we can to get him back into our family and get him safe," said Kluxen, of Lancaster.

    Kluxen said her brother and Tait, 31, never married and broke up about a year ago. Loren McMillan then moved to Kansas with their mother, she said.

    Kluxen, who has three children of her own, hadn't seen her nephews in about a year. But Tait "really seemed to love those kids" and regularly posted photos of the boys on her Facebook page until about a month ago, Kluxen said.

    She described the older child as a smart and funny boy. Scott looked a lot like his father and was a happy baby, Kluxen said. She said she doesn't know Gary Fellenbaum.

    She noted her parents had frequently helped her brother and Tait financially, and "anybody in the family would have swept those kids up in a second" if they knew there was a problem.

    "We just had no clue," Kluxen said. "What kind of people do things like that? There's not even words for it."

    Through tears, Paula Fellenbaum described her son as a hard worker who was "trying to make his way in the world." She said although she hadn't seen him in recent weeks, Gary Fellenbaum had recently visited his grandparents and nobody suspected any problems. She said they were shocked to learn of the charges against him.

    Shannon Taylor of West Caln Township said Tait was a "normal, goofy, everyday funny girl" when they regularly hung out several years ago.

    "I never would have pictured her hurting a fly," Taylor said.

    Yet when she saw Tait working at Wal-Mart two or three weeks ago, Tait was "pretty rough looking," Taylor said Friday. "She just looked like she just didn't care about herself really."

    Tait and Fellenbaum had moved into a West Caln mobile home about a month ago with Amber Fellenbaum, his estranged wife. Amber Fellenbaum called 911 on Tuesday after Scott stopped breathing, authorities said. She's charged with child endangerment for failing to help sooner.

    Reached by phone Friday, Amber Fellenbaum's mother declined to comment.

    http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/...ess/ar-AA6XY7G
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    Attorneys: Move ‘Scotty’ murder trial out of Chester County

    Attorneys for the man and woman accused of the brutal torture and murder of 3-year-old Scott “Scotty” McMillan want the trial of their clients moved from Chester County, or to have the jurors in the capital case chosen from another locale and brought here, saying the extensive pre-trial press and social media accounts of his death have forever tainted the local jury pool against them.

    The requests come among a multitude of pre-trial motions filed by both defendants and the prosecution in the case, which began two years ago with the discovery of McMillan’s lifeless body on Nov. 4, 2014, in the home he shared with his mother, brother, and the man who authorities said assaulted him repeatedly over the course of some weeks.

    In pre-trial motions filed recently with Common Pleas Judge William P. Mahon, defense attorney George S. Yacoubian Jr. of Radnor, who represents Gary Lee Fellenbaum, said that his client’s constitutional right to a fair trial had been hopelessly compromised by the pre-trial publicity the case had received in newspaper articles, television broadcasts, and internet posting.

    “The self-evident conclusion is that this county has been so saturated with the facts underlying this case that it is impossible for defendant to receive a fair trial before a jury of impartial persons who learn of the case only through the evidence properly admitted during trial,” Yacoubian wrote in his request for a change of venue.

    Laurence Harmelin of West Chester, a veteran county defense attorney representing Jillian Tait, McMillan’s mother and Fellenbaum’s girlfriend, also filed a motion requesting the trial be moved.

    Harmelin made mention of almost one dozen articles about the McMillan murder and the upcoming trial in the Daily Local News, as well as an online poll that appeared in 2015 asking “Death Penalty for Couple Who Tortured Boy?” He noted that many of the stories included graphic descriptions of McMillan’s death and the allegations against Tait.

    “The wide dissemination of such gruesome, sympathy-engendering, front-page news stories, Facebook articles and internet polls, has created a substantial likelihood that a fair trial cannot be provided, as it will be impossible for the defendant to select a fair and impartial jury of citizens from Chester County,” Harmelin wrote.

    Both attorneys ask Mahon to either move to trial to another county in the state, or in the alternative to bring residents of another county here to hear the case.

    A hearing on that motion, as well as the three dozen or more others that were filed by the deadline Mahon imposed earlier of Nov. 1, will be held on Jan. 5, 2017. The trial is scheduled to start April 3, 2017, with jury selection.

    Mahon has reportedly expressed concern privately about the jury selection process in the case of both Fellenbaum and Tait, who at this point will be tried together. Not only is the trial one in which the prosecution is seeking the death penalty against both defendants, which would require extensive questioning of each panelist to see whether they could impose a death sentence, but it also has been the subject of much discussion in the media, both locally and nationally.

    In addition, the allegations themselves that have been made against both defendants — that they participated in the beating and torture of 3-year-old Scotty and his older brother, now 8, and kept him from medical care in the West Caln trailer home they shared with Fellenbuam’s wife, Amber Marie Fellenbaum, and the Fellenbaum’s young child — could make it extraordinarily difficult to impanel a jury made up of people who declare they could judge the case fairly on the facts alone and not on sympathy for the victims.

    Mahon is reportedly considering calling in dozens more prospective jurors from the county than the 124 he had summoned in the last death penalty case over which he presided, that of Coatesville chainsaw killer Laquanta Chapman. He has also noted that extra alternate jurors might need to be empaneled because of the possibility that some jurors chosen might not be emotionally able to complete the trial.

    The last time a trial for a county crime was tried out of the county was reportedly the escape case involving then-convicted murderer Nicholas Yarris, who jumped out of a constable’s car in West Whiteland and fled while being transported from state prison to Delaware County. That was held in Carlisle, Cumberland County in the mid-1980s.

    The infamous Johnston Brothers murder trials were also heard by out-of-county juries in the early 1980s.

    Yacoubian, the private attorney who was hired by Gary Fellenbaum’s family to replace the county’s Public Defender’s Office over the summer, has made it clear in his motions that he is very concerned about the way the jurors are given the evidence in the case.

    In his motions, he asks Mahon to forbid all “in-life photographs” of McMillan that might prove inflammatory to the jurors; shield them from knowing beforehand what case they might be hearing; and order that there be strict rules about behavior by those attending the trial, including no talking or shaking heads during testimony, or displaying signs, banners, or clothing that might be prejudicial, both in the courtroom and outside the courthouse.

    For its part, the prosecution also filed motions in the case last week. In them, they ask Mahon to allow a computer simulation of the case to be used in opening statements, and to have McMillan’s older brother, who is expected to testify, give his testimony outside the presence of Fellenbaum. First District Attorney Michael Noone, who is leading the prosecution, also asked Mahon to allow an unidentified “support person” to be with the older child when he testifies.

    The Daily Local News is not reporting the name of the older brother.

    Gary Fellenbaum, 25, Tait, 32, and Amber Fellenbaum, 25, all worked at the Walmart in western Chester County in the summer and early fall of 2014. Tait moved in with the Fellenbaums at a trailer home on Hope Lane sometime in September, 2014.

    Beginning in October 2014, according to the allegations set forth in the case against the Fellenbaums and Tait, Gary Fellenbaum began physically abusing both of Tait’s sons. The abuse included punches and beatings, but also whipping with a crudely fashioned “cat o’nine tails,” and tying the boys to chairs or hanging them upside down by their feet.

    Allegedly Fellenbaum’s beating of Scott McMillan escalated to the point where the boy could not hold down his food. Angered, Fellenbaum allegedly punched him in the face so hard he fell out of his chair, and later punched him in the stomach. The boy began vomiting and later passed out. Although Fellenbaum and Tait tried to revive him, they left him alone in a bedroom for several hours before finding him completely unresponsive in the evening of Nov. 4, 2014.

    Both allegedly gave incriminating statements to police investigators after their arrests. Yacoubian and Harmelin have asked Mahon, in their motions, to suppress those statements, saying they were given under duress.

    Amber Fellenbaum, who did not participate in the alleged abuse, called 911. She is not charged with murder, but rather with endangering the welfare of children and recklessly endangering another person.

    http://www.dailylocal.com/general-ne...chester-county
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    Scotty McMillan crime scene photos released

    The death of three-year-old Scotty McMillan has attracted a considerable amount of media -- and public -- attention. That's because of the brutal fashion in which he was killed, and the people who were admittedly behind it. According to this Saturday news report, the death penalty is going to be sought against suspects Jillian Tait, 31, and Gary Fellenbaum, 23, and Amber Fellenbaum,21. The three reportedly participated in actions so horrific that they're difficult to print, which makes it hard to argue against the Death Penalty, which should only be saved for the worst of the worst in society.

    Over a course of three days, this little boy was subjected to a level of torture to which only prisoners of war can relate. He was punched in the face repeatedly, and he was tied up and hanged from his feet, upside down. He was beaten with a homemade whip. He was beaten with a rod, and his head was smashed into the wall. Photos of the crime scene have been released, showing the damage done to the walls of the trailer where this child was sadistically brutalized by the same people he relied upon for love, care and safety. The mother of Gary Fellenbaum appears to think her son is being "railroaded," and doesn't believe that he participated in this horrific torture. However, it needs to be noted that this man admitted to it. He confessed to committing the sadistic murder of a three-year-old child along with that boy's own mother. This crime was not committed without relish. People don't just torture children to death over a course of several days without enjoying it. These facts are evident to prosecutors who want to seek the death penalty against these vile killers.

    This case is eerily similar to the gruesome murder of Lattie McGee, who was also killed by his mother and her boyfriend. Like little Scotty McMillan, Lattie McGee was hanged upside down and beaten relentlessly over a course of many days by the people he relied upon to keep him safe. The level of torture he was subjected to at the young age of four-years-old is downright unthinkable. He was burned with cigarettes, burned with curling irons as well. He had been dunked in boiling water and scalded, leaving horribly disfiguring wounds on his body that had become infected from lack of care. Many of his bones were broken, including his collarbone, pelvis and a few of his ribs. Ultimately, it was a blow to the back of his head that killed him -- after he had asked for a glass of water.

    http://www.examiner.com/article/scot...hotos-released
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    Judge orders psych evalution for man in horrific slaying of 3-year-old

    A Chester County Court judge ordered a psychological evaluation for a man charged in the continual abuse and beating death of his girlfriend's 3-year-old son in 2014.

    Gary Lee Fellenbaum III, 25, and his girlfriend, 33-year-old Jillian Tait, are accused of beating 3-year-old Scott McMillan and his 6-year-old brother with their fists, frying pans, metal rods, and whips.

    Police said the adults also hung the children upside down by their feet and beat them and taped Scott to chair and beat him until he was unconscious.

    The abuse had continued for some time, and the fatal beatings occurred from Nov. 2 to Nov. 4, 2014, inside Fellenbaum's mobile home in West Caln Township, officials said.

    Prosecutors are pursuing the death penalty for Tait and Fellenbaum.

    At a hearing in West Chester on Thursday, Judge William P. Mahon said he had received a handwritten letter from Fellenbaum on Jan. 10 in which he said he wanted to represent himself at trial. Mahon said he notified prosecutors and Fellenbaum's attorney, George S. Yacoubian Jr., neither of whom knew of the letter.

    After Yacoubian talked to Fellenbaum, the attorney sent a letter to the judge, saying his client did not wish to represent himself and asking for a competency evaluation for Fellenbaum.

    On Thursday, Yacoubian said he no longer thought the evaluation was necessary.

    "In conversations with Mr. Fellenbaum, there were some issues that concerned me that prompted my request for a competency hearing," Yacoubian told the judge.

    But, he said, after talking further with Fellenbaum, it was now clear to him his client is competent and understands the court proceedings. He said Fellenbaum's statements that made him question his client's mental state came from "undue influence" from fellow inmates at the Chester County Prison.

    Michael Noone, Chester County's first assistant district attorney, said a dismissal of the initial request for a psychological evaluation might raise questions later about the integrity of a possible conviction.

    "At this point, once competency is raised, the proverbial genie is out of the bottle and needs to be addressed," Noone said.

    The judge agreed and gave the defense 45 days to finalize a psychological evaluation report.

    The judge rescheduled the trial, which had been set to start in early April, for September 18. It is expected to draw a jury pool of 250 or more and last three weeks.

    http://www.philly.com/philly/news/ne...-year-old.html
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    2 former Lancaster residents plead guilty to roles in 2014 torture death of 3-year-old in Chester County

    By Jonas Fortune
    Lancaster Online

    Two former Lancaster County women have pleaded guilty to their roles in the 2014 torture death of a 3-year-old boy.

    Jillian Tait, 33, pleaded guilty to charges including third-degree murder and conspiracy to commit first-degree murder in the death of her son, Scott McMillan.

    Amber Fellenbaum, 24, pleaded guilty to two counts of third-degree felony endangering the welfare of a child and two misdemeanor counts of recklessly endangering another person.

    As part of the plea agreements, both women are now required to testify against Gary Lee Fellenbaum III, 25, in his upcoming murder trial.

    The former Solanco School District student is charged with first-degree murder, third-degree murder, criminal homicide and several other charges related to the boy's Nov. 4, 2014, death.

    He faces the death penalty.

    Tait, a 2003 Garden Spot graduate, won't face the death penalty as part of the plea agreement accepted Wednesday by Chester County Judge William P. Mahon.

    Instead, she faces a maximum sentence of 64 to 128 years in prison, according to the Chester County Clerk of Courts office.

    Amber Fellenbaum's felony charges each carry a maximum sentence of seven years in prison. She is a 2011 graduate of Penn Manor High School and is married to Gary Fellenbaum.

    Sentencing for both women was deferred until after Gary Fellenbaum's trial, which was recently rescheduled. A new date has not been announced.

    McMillan was tortured over the course of several weeks after Tait, along with McMillan's 6-year-old brother, moved into a mobile home near Coatesville with Gary and Amber Fellenbaum, according to authorities. The Fellenbaum's 11-month old child also lived in the home.

    Tait was Gary Fellenbaum's girlfriend.

    Gary Fellenbaum is accused of torturing McMillan during the weeks they lived together.

    McMillan was whipped with a metal rod, hit with blunt and sharp objects and was taped to a chair and beaten, police said.

    Following a beating, McMillan became unconscious on Nov. 4 and was left in a room while Tait and Gary Fellenbaum shopped, ate pizza and napped, according to previous media reports.

    Tait and the Fellenbaums are currently held at Chester County Prison.

    Amber Fellenbaum is held in lieu of $500,000 bail, court records show. Tait and Gary Fellenbaum are ineligible for bail due to the nature of the charges.

    http://lancasteronline.com/news/loca...0b8292fad.html
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    "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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    Man ruled competent for capital murder trial in boy's death

    WEST CHESTER, Pa. (AP) – A judge has ruled a man competent for his capital murder trial in the beating death of his former girlfriend's young son and initially declined a defense request to move the proceedings or bring in an outside jury.

    The man, Gary Lee Fellenbaum III, is scheduled for trial in September in the death of 3-year-old Scott McMillan. District Attorney Thomas Hogan has said the boy "was systematically tortured and beaten to death" in 2014 in a mobile home in West Caln Township.

    Judge William P. Mahon, who ordered a psychological evaluation of Fellenbaum in January, ruled on Monday that the defendant is competent for trial in Chester County. Defense attorney George Yacoubian Jr. didn't immediately return a call seeking comment Monday.

    Yacoubian, citing newspaper reports, social media posts and other publicity, said in court that "there is probably enough pretrial publicity" to warrant bringing up an outside jury. But Michael Noone, the county's first assistant district attorney, argued that publicity was not "so extensive, sustained and pervasive" to warrant such an action, and the judge said he agreed for the moment.

    "It's not my impression at this point the court would be incapable of selecting a fair and unbiased jury based on the evidence presented at this point," the judge said, but he added that the issue could be revisited if there was trouble assembling a panel.

    The boy's mother, Jillian Tait, pleaded guilty last week to third-degree murder and conspiracy and agreed to testify against Fellenbaum. Prosecutors have said they plan to seek the death penalty if he is convicted of first-degree murder.

    Authorities said the couple had met working at a Wal-Mart several months earlier and moved in together in a mobile home park along with Fellenbaum's estranged wife, Tait's 6- and 3-year-old children and the Fellenbaums' 11-month-old daughter.

    Authorities alleged in court documents that spankings turned to abuse and the victim was finally "punched and beaten with blunt and sharp objects, whipped, taped to a chair with electrical tape and beaten, hung up by his feet and beaten and suffered other acts of violence."

    Prosecutors also alleged the couple went car shopping, bought pizza and engaged in sexual activity as the boy lay dying after weeks of escalating abuse.

    http://www.foxnews.com/us/2017/04/17...boy-death.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."
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    "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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    Jury selection set for this month in ‘Scotty’ trial

    By Michael Rellahan
    The Daily Local News

    WEST CHESTER - Later this month, dozens of Chester County residents will gather on the seventh floor of the county Justice Center to begin the process of jury selection in the case of the man accused by authorities of the torture and death of a 3-year-old boy, Scott “Scotty” McMillan.

    But whether a jury is actually empaneled at that time in the case of Gary Lee Fellenbaum remains an open question.

    Common Pleas Judge William P. Mahon, who is overseeing the case against Fellenbaum — in which the prosecution is seeking the death penalty — has given defense counsel the opportunity to ask that a jury be brought in from another county or the trial be moved, should it become clear that an insufficient number of those potential jurors called say they can fairly and objectively decide the case against the 26-year-old former West Caln man.

    In a ruling handed down last month, Mahon formally denied attorney George S. Yacoubian of Radnor’s motion for a change of venue in the trial of Fellenbaum, who authorities said beat and tortured the young boy over a period of days in October and November 2014 in a house trailer where he lived with the boy’s mother, her other son, his wife and their child.

    Yacoubian had argued that the pre-trial publicity surrounding the case, which included dozens of news stories both nationally and internationally, made it impossible to choose an impartial jury in Chester County. A recent internet search of the words “Fellenbaum Scotty” returned about 68,000 results. But while Mahon rejected that claim, he did allow the defense to renew its motion during jury selection, “if appropriate.”

    Observers have wondered whether there will be enough jurors to say they could hear the case without bias given the nature of the allegations, the age of the victim, and the potential for the death penalty. Mahon has said he will add four additional alternate jurors to the panel of 12 to make sure there are enough jurors to begin deliberating the evidence if some are forced to drop out because of a reaction to the gruesome evidence the prosecution is expected to introduce.

    The jury selection process will begin on Monday, Sept. 18, when 100 prospective jurors are summoned to the Justice Center, with another 100 expected to appear two days later. The panelists will be given a multi-page questionnaire developed by Yacoubian and prosecutors First Assistant District Attorney Michael G. Noone and Deputy District Attorney Michelle E. Frei about their knowledge of the case and their thoughts about the criminal charges, the death penalty, and sundry other topics.

    Afterwards, the prospective jurors will be asked whether they can sit through the trial over its expected two to three-week length, and Mahon will issue dismissal for hardships. Once those are completed, he will begin the more complicated task of conducting individual questioning, called “voir dire” of those who remain.

    In addition to the motion on the jury, Mahon issued a number of orders last month related to the trial. Among those were a dismissal of the defense’s motion to suppress statements Fellenbaum gave to police the night that McMillan’s body was found in the mobile home on Hope Lane. But he did grant the motion to keep Fellenbaum’s offhand remark that, “This would never have happened if he had just eaten his breakfast,” from the jury.

    Mahon has indicated that he will set formal rules of decorum for those who intend to attend jury selection in Courtroom One and the trial in Courtroom Four, including the media. He will prohibit those in the courtroom from using cellphones while testimony is underway, or from displaying banners about the case or wearing clothing depicting McMillian’s photograph. A group known as Bikers Against Child Abuse has protested outside the courthouse demanding the death penalty for Fellenbaum, and its members have attended prior hearings asking “Justice for Scotty.”

    Members of the press and media will be allowed to use computers for note taking, but will not be permitted to post information on social media sites during the testimony. If they do, their computers will be confiscated and they may be barred from attending future proceedings. Similar rules were put in place by Montgomery County Judge Steven T. O’Neill during comedian Bill Cosby’s trial earlier this year on sexual assault charges.

    McMillan died on Nov. 4, 2014 of multiple blunt force trauma brought on by weeks of beating and torture he allegedly suffered at the hands of Fellenbaum and his mother, Jillian Tait.

    Beginning in October 2014, according to the allegations set forth in the case, Fellenbaum began physically abusing both of his girlfriend, Tait’s, sons. The abuse included punches and beatings, but also whipping with a crudely fashioned “cat o’nine tails,” and tying the boys to chairs or hanging them upside down by their feet.

    Allegedly, Fellenbaum’s beating of Scott McMillan escalated to the point where the boy could not hold down his food. Angered, Fellenbaum allegedly punched him in the face so hard he fell out of his chair, and later punched him in the stomach. The boy began vomiting and later passed out. Although Fellenbaum and Tait tried to revive him, they left him alone in a bedroom for several hours before finding him completely unresponsive in the evening of Nov. 4, 2014.

    Both allegedly gave incriminating statements to police investigators after their arrests.

    Tait and Amber Fellenbaum, Fellenbaum’s wife, have entered guilty pleas in the case. Tait pleaded guilty to charges of third-degree murder and conspiracy, and Amber Fellenbaum pleaded guilty to two counts of third-degree felony endangering the welfare of a child and two misdemeanor counts of recklessly endangering another person. Both are expected to testify for the prosecution in the trial.

    http://www.dailylocal.com/article/DL...NEWS/170909946

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