By Katherine Ramsland
According to former detective Vernon Geberth in Sex-related Homicide and Death Investigation, the abduction and murder of a child under eighteen by a stranger is rare. "Statistically, they comprise about .50 of 1% of all murders in the United States (between 100 and 200 cases annually.)" Yet these incidents affect communities far more traumatically than similar abduction/murders of adults, because it is among the worst scenarios any parent can imagine. When three members of the Groene-Mckenzie family were bludgeoned to death in their home in Idaho on May 15, 2005 and young Shasta and Dylan Groene were kidnapped, it became instant national news.
Thanks to the nationwide Amber Alert program, several people recognized Shasta in a restaurant, which probably saved her life. She told police that over the course of several days, she and her nine-year-old brother had been repeatedly sexually assaulted by their kidnapper. Then he'd taken Dylan away, tortured and shot him, burned his remains and fled with her. (Dylan's remains were found in Montana.) There's little doubt, if not for the intervention of concerned citizens, that she was next.
Their abductor was James Edward Duncan III, a convicted child molester. His criminal history includes a long string of assaults against children, as well as at least one other murder. He remains a suspect in several as-yet unsolved cases, and in his online blog, he alluded to having committed murder more than once. Duncan officially began his criminal career in 1978 when he was fifteen by forcibly raping a nine-year-old boy at gunpoint. Apparently he told a therapist that he'd already assaulted at least a dozen boys in a similar manner, six of whom he'd bound. Only two years later, he was in prison for raping a 14-year-old boy.
Duncan remained in prison for fourteen years, and his parole conditions stipulated that he stay away from children. He apparently managed to do that, at least according to official records, though several children disappeared in places where he lived and those cases are still under investigation. Reportedly, he admitted to FBI agents that he was involved in the abduction and murder of Anthony Martinez in Riverside, California in 1997. He'd attempted to grab Anthony's brother as well, but that boy escaped.
In April 2006, Duncan was charged in Minnesota with molesting a six-year-old boy and attempting to molest his friend. Bond was posted and Duncan then purchased a shotgun, a claw hammer, and ammunition. He stole a Jeep Grand Cherokee and fled the state, arriving in Idaho. He apparently spotted the Groene children in their yard, and staked out the home for a few days until he determined the right time to go grab the kids. Instead of taking them from the yard, he decided to kill three people inside the home. Even worse, rather than just shoot them, he chose instead to bind them and use the claw hammer to bludgeon them to death. Each person heard the others being killed, which bears witness to Duncan's need to inflict psychological as well as physical torture. He also described to Shasta and Dylan what he had done to their family and recorded his treatment of them for his later enjoyment.
Duncan, 42, had grown mean over the years, and viewed his treatment as unjust. He'd kept a Web diary labeled "Blogging the Fifth Nail," a reference to the nails used on Jesus Christ during his crucifixion. In some entries, Duncan discussed the idea of right and wrong and his awareness that he did not know the difference. "God has shown me the right choice," he wrote in April 2005, "but the demons have tied me to a spit and the fire has already been lit." Duncan also expressed a great deal of anger over his social isolation, the result of his Level III sex offender status, and he wanted to strike out at society. "My intent," he wrote, "is to harm society as much as I can, and die." Apparently his aim was to kill people and grab children for his own pleasure. In one entry, just four days before the Idaho murders and abductions, he wrote, "The demons have taken over." Yet writing from prison, he apparently takes credit for coming "into the light" by returning the girl to her home.
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