Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence, and is not intended for all
audiences. Listener discretion is advised. This woman's a media sessions. Can you
ask for where the mail ran to where he went? I don't think this
woman's going to have any idea where she one? Hello and welcome. This
is season ten, episode two hundred and forty two, A Sword and Scale,
the show that reveals that the worst monsters are real. All right,
you got me, You got me pissed off. You did it, you
went and did it, you got me all pissed off. I'm flustered.
People, listen. I know that figuring out how things work in the world
is hard to do, especially for the dim witted. But let me explain
something to you. I started this podcast ten years ago when there were no
other true crime podcasts at all period. I'm not about to start to listen
to all of them to make sure they haven't covered a story we're about to
cover before we cover it. You get it? Do we have you figured
it out yet? No? At some point in your life you may find
yourself tested in storytelling. It's a call to action. It's when the hero
finds themselves in a situation that could change their whole lives. They could do
nothing, ignore the situation and take the easy path and everything would stay the
same. Or they could take the hard path, overcome the situation and set
off on a hero's journey, culminating in a great triumph, forever altering the
character. But all too often in our society we find ourselves in situations such
as this and take the easy path, letting unknown villains run rampant. March
fourteenth, twenty thirteen, was a cloudy and cold day in Clay, New
York, a city central in the state. At eight pm, the sun
had already set and the waxing crescent moon had yet to rise. Bill Craig
found himself on an unfamiliar road to a life changing event. I can't tell
you why I was on Verplank Road that night, except for the fact that
I took some back roads to go buy lottery tickets. I would have never
ever gone down that road to get to my home. I would have went
in front of them all on a whim. He took a different route home
that evening. While close to a major shopping center, Verplank Road was quite
remote, and all of a sudden, something caught my eye on the side
of the road. It wasn't just something, it was someone, a young
girl on the side of the road. She was underdressed, considering it was
thirty degree weather and there was snow on the ground. My thoughts went from
maybe someone setting me up just to hop for to do something to myself,
or maybe there's been an accident. But it just the dots didn't connect.
Something wasn't right. As I stopped my car and I put it in park,
I left it running and opened the door, and immediately after I opened
that car door, and things weren't right. There was a young girl,
there's absolutely in hysterics on the side of the road. Basically started calling nine
one one, nine one one. Mandy wears the emergency Jeff shotting in a
play. I'm on, I don't even know, um, there's a there's
there's a there's a little girl tied up on the side of the road.
Okay, a woman bleeding. Where are you guys? I need to learn
case and I understand, ma'am. I'm just trying to I don't usually say
this. Road. Bill had stumbled on a fresh crime scene. A little
girl running down the road was partially tied up and her mother collapsed covered in
blood. Nearby. Their car was stuck in the snow in a ditch.
I'm going to stay on the phone with you. Do you want them in
your car now? Or they still don't know. I'm just it's kind of
spooky thing. I'm trying to figure out what's going on here. Okay,
I'm selling you on Verplank Road, and that is the name of the road.
Okay, do you see any house, summers or anything by you.
I'm more towards the cemetery. You couldn't be sure what was going on.
The girl and the woman were obviously in distress and needed help, but Bill
had no idea. Da, why, what's what's going on? I'm out
with nine to one. There's a woman out here, there's what kind of
athlete? And I'm in a white I'm gonna sir you you're gonna stick around
here, I'm gonna get out. I just what kind of vehicle? White?
I'm in a white? Uh, I don't drive this. There's another
gentleman here, there's a woman that is bleeding, she may be dead,
and there's a little girl tied up on the side of the roads. He
says, somebody beat her. If you couldn't make out what the little girl
was yelling in the background, she said he strangled her and he hurt me,
so did. They asked her what the address is where you are?
There is no address, man, okay, and and I'm not being shut
with you here. I'm sorry. No, no, that's fine. I
completely We were more towards like um Bennett Roade and for playing, although they
said they've been jack. Bill was trying to figure out the nearest crossroad.
The little girl yelled, he's up there. He stole my car. That's
when Bill realized this might not be over. Luckily for this little girl,
Bill was the perfect person to stumble upon a crime. Yeah. I spent
four years active duty with the United States Army and the Soldier Biological and Chemical
Command. This is one of the things that I used to do in the
military is protect people, and it just my training took over. This little
girl was scared and she didn't want to leave her mother. But now that
Bill knew there may still be someone lurking nearby, he had to put her
at ease to ensure her safety. Honey, honey, get in the car.
No, ma'am, I'm a little. I'm not gonna hurt you.
I'm out with nine one, okay, honey. And this is a child
that said this not leaving your mom. I want you to get warm money,
okay, get in here, okay. Not knowing who or what or
how many, I basically approached the young girl and my goal was to get
her secure and safe. Understandably, so, she was concerned about who was
even approaching her. And I just kept trying, you know, I just
I told her that I was a friend. I just kept repeating, I'm
a friend, I'm a friend. And after the first couple of times,
and she trusted me, and I don't know why, but she did.
And basically what I did at that point is I secured her in my vehicle,
still on the phone with nine one this whole time. Yes, she
should be scared. What your mommy's mean? Lorie Brezan Okay, sir,
can you see the mother at all? Can you see as she's breathing.
I'm gonna check right now, honey. I'm gonna I am a friend,
Okay, I'm not gonna hurt you. I'm gonna close the door. We
need people immediately. But this guy could be on a loose, shir I
do I have everybody notified at this point? Can you pull back so I
can get a light on her. Now that the girl was safe, or
as safe as he could make her, Bill needed to check on the mother.
Another passer by had already stopped to help. Bill instructed him to watch
the little girl while he tried to help Laurie. Ma'am, Yeah, I'm
here. Okay, she is breathing. She is breathing. Okay, okay,
grow all the sea. Look about sir. She I'd say she's about
thirty five, ma'am? Does away walking to you? She is talking to
me. She's lost a lot of blood. Can you tell us she's bleeding
there in her head? Will you stad ma'am? Or anything? Or just
beating? Just beating? Does she know who did this? Do you know
who did this to you? You know the man? No? No,
she said they were card jack. Okay, you're doing good. You're doing
super. Just keep way to go, Just keep staying with me. Okay,
honey, you're doing super. Okay, ask her, ask her if
she can give you a description of the guy who did this. Can you
can you tell me what this guy looked like? Man? Would you black,
Would you white? Was he Hispanic? Laurie Bresnahan lay on the side
of the road, losing a lot of blood. She was able to give
Bill some info, but she was fading fast. Perhaps she didn't realize during
the struggle that the man was holding a knife and not simply beating her,
or maybe she was already too far gone to convey that information. Regardless,
Bill tried to keep her awake, even though he knew it was likely already
too late. There's too much damage there was. There was very little convent
on her before she lost consciousness. Bill swore to her that he would keep
the little girl safe and that I would not let anybody touch herr armor anymore,
and she was aware and cognizant of that before she passed. Laurie was
a librarian at a local elementary school. She devoted herself to the betterment of
children. She was unmarried, but adopted the little girl when she was about
three months old from China. Leedless to say her little girl was her whole
world. I'll be honest with you, I think that I think Laurie continued
to fight for the little girl until she knew she was safe with police and
first responders still on the way. Bill needed more information to help catch who
did this. Once again, he directed the other man who stopped to stay
with Laurie while he talked of the little girl should stay with her, I
might thought to the little girl, I wasn't leaving her side. I stayed
with her. I tried to comfort her, and also I'm still on with
nine one through the attempt to give first aid to Lorie. Now back into
the vehicle with a little girl. Now training takes over again. Two types
daddy trying to be a good father and comfort a scared little girl, but
interweaving getting information from her about who, what, where and when? What
was going on? You're doing really good, sweet, I want you to
go slow. Was he white? Was he bladder? He was a white
man? Do you remember about how was you? My height? Probviously about
five kind of man? Okay, after I see the staying in the medium
large belt? Was he a big? Was heast heavy? Was he skinny?
Skinny? Was skinny? Okay? Do you remember what he was wearing?
So he had he over his ears? Honey, okay, I'm going
to give her my jack a coldown please here. And he has glasses,
he has glasses. Okay. As Bill asked the little girl questions, they
quickly got the description of an average height, skinny white guy with hair over
his ears, who wears glasses. Can you ask the little girl where this
wall happened? Where they were picked up? Where the guy got in their
assle? Where did this happen? Where did you get picked up? Honey?
Okay? He had a gun, ma'am. She said she was leaving
her gymnastics class at the Great Northern Mall when the man pulled out his gun
and pushed his way into their car behind the little girl, and he threatened
to kill him. The guns were out and pointed at him. Okay,
was it just one? Mail? Asked him one money, one person or
two? One person? Was one gun? Can you ask for what he
was wearing? You remember what he was wearing? All black, a black
jacket. Maybe from sports authority, your mind doing science medio? Okay.
It was then that the paramedics arrived, followed by the state police. Yet
I long ago horned y, all right, I got the deputies. All
right, I'm gonna go ahead and let you go. O. Okay,
all right, thank you bye. The police arrived and assessed the situation before
pursuing the suspect. Laurie was clinging to life and wouldn't make it through the
night. The culprit was still on the loose, but Bill had kept the
little girl safe. This whole ordeal, however, was far from over.
Bill Craig stumbled upon Laurie Bresnahan, stabbed and bloody with her daughter on the
side of a rural road after sunset. The little girl's hands were bound behind
her back. She claimed a man stole their car at gunpoint and hurt them.
Bill relayed as much information to nine one one as he could get from
a wounded Laurie and a traumatized little girl. Once the state police arrived,
Bill felt a little bit of relief, like the situation was out of his
hands. But that's when he realized what the little girl meant when she said
he hurt me. I know, when I looked at the mail paramedic that
I asked to get out, it was almost like sorrow. I mean,
when I, you know, said I think that you know she's been assaulted,
it was like, are you kidding me? Not only had this man
forced his way into the Bresnahan's car, brandishing a gun and eventually add Laurie,
but he had also sexually assaulted the little girl. Trooper Jeff Sikora would
be the first officer to arrive on the scene. He was another perfect person
to respond to such a tragedy. After nine to eleven, he went to
ground zero to do his duty and help, and when he learned that the
little girl had been assaulted, he knew this was a significant situation. Initially,
I thought that the call, which came out as a carjacking, sexual
assault and stabbing was a hoax. The information that we initially got just didn't
make sense. You know, that doesn't happen up here. It doesn't happen
in our county. The information was that there was a young victim, there
were weapons, and there were injuries. He rushed to the scene, hoping
it was just a hoax. I rolled up right behind the first rescue rick,
ran around the truck, and then I found Laurie laying right about here.
She was bleeding heavily. I got right down to her and I asked
her, who did this steer And she's still conscious and breathing, and I
know she's alive, and she's looking at me, but she just didn't have
the strength answer. That's when Trooper Sikora met Bill. As silly as this
may sound, in a chaotic situation like that, I saw a confidence in
his eyes, and it made me feel that we're going to be okay.
Bill tells me that there is a little there's a female victim, and he
tells me that she's been sexually assaulted. I said, okay, where is
she? And we opened his car door to find the little girl sitting in
the backseat. She's still bound behind her back. She was severely injured,
but she was still able to tell me the details of her assault, and
she gave me a description of this suspect. She gave me a description of
the weapons that were used. He told me to stay with the girl,
and I wasn't leaving her anyways. So if he would have, well,
I shouldn't say that if you, if you would have told me to go,
I probably would into or at least I would have resisted a little bit.
But I was not leaving her side. She and I, in the
small amount of time, had developed a trust bond and she didn't want me
to leave her side. Witness and protector Bill stayed with the little girl as
officers began to search for the suspect and paramedics tried to save Laurie. The
way he approached this scene, secured this scene, did an assessment of everything
that was going on, and then was able to go ahead and relay information
and then hand off the information he had to another team member, and then
he led the pursuit and the woods Officer Sakora just happened to be the canine
officer in the area, so he was primed to pursue the man into the
woods at night. I was able to get my canine partner out along with
super House and super Hunt and Deputy Joe Strom and Deputy Bloodgood. They provided
cover for me because we knew that this guy was still armed, We knew
that this guy was desperate, we knew what he was capable of, and
I'm sure any one of these guys would tell you that we fully expected to
be shot at that night. Even with the assumption of danger, those officers
felt the necessity for the suspect to answer for what he had done, So
the three officers took off into the woods. It's pitch black out here.
We're using flashlights, so he knows we're coming. We just don't know where
he's at. We don't know if he's going to jump out and start shooting.
It's dark and the officer can't see pass the end of their flashlight beams,
but the night is still, and the dog caught a scent immediately.
They tracked the man through the high brush woods and over a railroad. Occasionally
they could see footprints in the snow and mud, so they knew they were
on the right track. By this time, every police officer, deputy,
and trooper is converging on the area. We end up tracking through the woods
and then we come down our plank road and as we're coming down, Investigator
dar Sign sees the subject running down the road, at which point he turns
around and follows him down Room fifty seven. Not catching him wasn't an option.
We knew what he had done, we knew what he was capable of,
and chances are he would do it again, so we knew how important
it was to catch him. Point as we come out into this field,
not only is my dog right on the scent, but now I can see
some footprints and some of the mud and snow and whatnot, and the footprints
come right down, so the mailbox. That's right here in front of us,
turning control hite mail going found foot on the gap in self, point
and turn around and offer consumer by the irradiate okay. Running down the road
unto an officer in an unmarked police car saw a man matching the description running
down Route fifty seven, not far from for Plank Road. He turned around,
raced back to the man, stopped the car blocking his way forward,
dived out of the vehicle, and tackled him without incident. Other officers arrived
quickly to find the man face down in the snow, his hands cuffed behind
his back. The man was quiet and calm, too calm for having just
been slammed to the ground. He claimed he was just coming from a friend's
house down the road. It was an obvious lie, as he couldn't tell
them where his friend's house was or where he was going. Also, he
fit the description given by the little girl to a t, and even had
scratches across his face. Hurt, he didn't speak except monosyllabically to answer the
question of officers a word. They searched him to find him empty handed except
for some car keys. He was unarmed, with no gun no knife,
no phone, no wallet, and no idea. So yeah, I'll find
yourself carcase. Who's wallet? Who's wallet? I don't have a lot um
um If you couldn't hear what he said in that inordinate pause, he said
of friends, but they were actually the keys to Laurie's car. He was
caught red handed, but still he didn't want to cooperate. He refused to
give the officers his name. I'm pretty sure we talked before we met before,
so because not seeing you before, I don't aware, maybe fifty seven,
but i've seen you, I don't know, so you name. His
face was hard to forget. He kind of had a perpetual dumb look on
his face. But it wasn't his fault. He had a birth defect that
left him with a rather large bump or hump on the right side of his
face. One of his eyes was noticeably lower than the other, and his
mouth was well off center. In the back of the car, he barely
spoke for a long time. He kind of answered questions, but none that
were actually important, like what's your name? I mean he knew that they
knew what he had done. What's use the alphabet? What's the first letter,
did you want David D? John? Gave him sure, yet,
name our aid and theater. Finally he gave them his name, David John
Wren's. He was a twenty nine year old man who lived with his mom.
Why is that a common theme? He was dressed in all black.
He was light complexed and had hair down to his ears, and he was
skinny. But he differed from the original description in height. He was quite
short, only about five foot four inches tall. Also, he was clearly
Asian, not white. But when officers showed a picture of him to the
little girl, she began to sob. She was sure it was the man
who hurt her. Never kind of rest before richer Alan Runchmali emergency. Yes,
I'm calling because I'm trying to get right on a call. He has
um one of d He was supposed to be at nine o'clock. He has
one of those um honoring these vices on his leg. Can we track yet?
Can we find out where he is? Your name Jathleene Ran. When
Kathleen Wren's got home from work, she was worried that her son wasn't already
there. What's your son name, David Ran? How old is this at
twenty nine. It's a light wall. Are you planning to see a light
wall? A white nail? He's Categoriental chat Asian. Do you know how
long he's been down for? You know, I don't well. I came
home he was from He was called wall how response? His cellphone is still
here here and so I'm home? What's up? Fall? He was arrested
by FBI agents. So he's supposed to be home by nine o'clock. He
got a house lost. It's not really color. You go wherever he wants,
you know what, He's appposed to be within stavicinities and stuff with kids
and all that, but not supposed to be in certain vicinities and stuff with
kids and all that. This vague statement from his mother was an understatement.
Not only was David RN's prohibited from being around kids, he had to quit
his job at a local grocery store because kids were sometimes customers, and his
computer usage was monitored by federal software. You see, he had been arrested
in January of that year by the FBI for you guessed it, child pornography.
He was released to await trial after two days in custody. The only
thing keeping him honest was a GPS monitor on his ankle, something that was
supposed to account for dangerous people. But before that he was, by all
accounts, a good person. He graduated from East Syracuse Minoah High School and
attended several colleges, eventually graduating summa cum laude with a Bachelor in Arts in
Computer science from the State University of New York. He even rose to the
level of front and supervisor before having to quit the grocery store. He did
have a couple of setbacks in his life, though His father died when he
was nine, a hard thing to deal with at any age, but also
Wrens had been born with a birth defect. His jaw was fused at birth,
and he had undergone several surgeries in his life to correct it, yet
his face remained noticeably disfigured. Later, the Onondaga County District Attorney would reveal
details about his crimes during a press conference in forming the public of the grand
jury indictment. This morning, an Onondaga County grand jury has returned a thirty
seven count indictment in front of Judge Anthony Alloy against twenty nine year old David
Rens. Forty seven year old Lorie Bresnahan and ten year old Jane Doe,
a child whose identity is known to the grand jury, left a gymnastics practice
class at the Great Northern Mall in the town of Clay. David Rens,
it is alleged, followed Laurie and the child to their car and a parking
lot. At that point, he brandished what appeared to be a pistol and
forced his way into Laurie's car and directed her to drive to a remote area
of the parking lot behind the mall. In the parking lot, he used
twist ties to bound Laurie's hands behind her back, and then he made the
ten year old child remove her clothes and put on a pair of pantyhose that
he had brought with him. He then tied her hands as well, behind
her back. It is further alleged that Wrens cut a hole in the panty
hose and began a sexual assault on Jane Doe. Jane Doe, as the
little girl was referred to, suffered extensive injuries from the assault and needed a
blood transfusion and surgery to repair the damage. It is further alleged by the
grand jury that the defendant drove the victim's car out of the parking lot and
eventually stopped on for Plank Road, which is just north of great More Northern
Mall, and the car became stuck in the snow on the side of the
road. The grand jury found that at dead point, mister Wrens attacked Laurie,
began to strangle her with his hands, and then attempted to tie her
head to the headrest at the passenger seat of the car with cable ties.
Laurie put up an extensive struggle that ties broke several times, and at this
time Laurie told Jane Doe to run and get out of the car. Although
Jane had her hands tied behind her back, she was able to open the
back door. It's a very extraordinary young girl, and she ran away.
As she ran away, she noticed that Laurie was able to break free and
escape from the car, and at that point Jane observed Wren's chasing Laurie around
the car. Laurie's cause of death was six stab wounds to the chest and
head, with a contributory cause of strangulation. Thankfully, Jane hadn't witnessed Laurie
being stabbed. She had already suffered so much. The defendant had the keys
to the victim's car in his pocket. He had blood on his pants,
on his underwear, and on his genitals. The New York State Police today
search warrant and rends his home and found several CDs and DVDs that contained child
pornography. The pornography they found depicted the same violent act that Rends carried out
against Little Jane. Also among the discs of child porn, officers found a
package of children's pantyhose and a receipt for zip ties. Also a receipt for
a Baretta's style pellet gun. The gun he used wasn't even real. There
are numerous murder counts. To be clear, they alleged intentional murder in the
first degree and that requires an intentional murder along with the commission of another felony.
There are four counts of murder in the first degree. The four underlying
felonies are kidnapping, rape, criminal sexual act, and sexual abuse. There
are also murder second accounts contained in the indictment. There are charges of kidnapping,
rape, criminal sexual act, and sexual abuse. Are also possession of
weapons charges. The only thing that could even be considered good news out of
this situation was the little girl's fortitude and the kindness of two men who stopped
to help. The one thing that I did take away from it is that
Laurie died really saving Jane Doe. There's no question that she attempted to distract
ends so that little Jane could get away. She is, she was a
she was an outstanding witness, and she will be an outstanding witness of trials.
She has a very very good recollection of what happened. She's an extraordinary
little girl. I don't have any doubt in my mind that we would be
here discussing an indictment for the murder of Laurie Bresnahan and the murder of Jane
Doe where it not for those two gentlemen. I have spoken to the State
Police. My office and the State Police will both presenting as small a token
as it seems, with an award the next month. Needless to say,
the reveal of the details of the case did little to quell the fear and
outrage the public was feeling. They rightfully didn't understand how someone already charged with
possession of child porn was allowed to commit murder, and more importantly, how
someone like him was allowed probation in the first place. Have you checked up
on the decisions your elected officials are making lately? You might want to do
that. Then, to make matters even worse, a woman came forward with
information about Renz's path past. A woman who wishes to remain anonymous, says
Wrens and an accomplice sexually molested her in nineteen ninety nine when she was nine
years old. Because Rens was fifteen at the time, the case was handled
in family court and the records were sealed, and criminal trials, the judge
often considers a defendant's past criminal record when making judgments, but crimes committed while
a minor are often sealed and therefore inaccessible. No, I can't comment specifically
on the details. But there was a juvenile record at the time which was
sealed, and it was sealed at the time of the bail hearing, and
to get those records unsealed usually takes some time and motions before a court to
obtain that information was obtainable time was that hearing. No. No, in
the timeframe of the hearing, it would not have been and that's not uncommon
to have juvenile records that are sealed that come up with respect the defendants.
Well, when it comes to a case where you're dealing with a child printer,
okay, even if it's pornography, you know, should those juvenile records
be automatically un sealed so that prior to a hearing of this nature, a
judge and everybody has a full awareness of the situation. Jim, that's a
good question and one perhaps that the state legislature should take up in terms of
modifying the current procedures, I want to wait in in a couple of things.
First of all, in America, you have a constitutional right to be
a knit wi all right. And some of the things that I read about
Judge Andrew Baxter were completely inappropriate and out a line. He made a judgment
call based on all of the events, and he didn't just say okay,
mister Wren's walk out of the courtroom and promise to come back. He listened
to both sides. He made the guy wear an ankle bracea that he restricted
him. But to criticize Judge Baxter for what he did in this case,
if someone has a crystal ball and know that someone's going to go from Decon
five to Deacon one in three weeks. Please share that with me so that
I can take it over to federal court and I can give it out to
all the judges in Onondaga County as well. Okay, here's the crystal ball.
You ready, You're ready? Here it is don't let petos out of
prison? Okay. An alternative is, why don't you just shut up and
let us do our job and let the facts come out. You cannot read
the facts of this case and not start crying. You just can't. There's
no reason in the world why the DA's office, State Police US Attorney should
jump through hoops to find out about what somebody did when they were the precious
age of fourteen, fifteen, or sixteen. The realization that Ren's committed such
heinous crimes less than nine weeks after being released from jail awaiting trial for federal
child pornography charges didn't sit well with the public at large, especially when they
learned that he had previously been charged with molesting a nine year old with an
accomplice. But all that outrage aside, how did this person under twenty four
hour GPS monitoring by a federal agency. A federal agency, by the way,
that monitors you and me every day, drive miles from home to stock,
kidnap, assault Jane, and murder Lorie. How was he not stopped?
Well, the answer to that question will piss you off all over again.
You see, three years earlier, the federal probation officers in Syracuse are
trying to get used to the new Execute Track one ankle bracelet. As you
might expect, the device reported the wearer's location all the time, but it
also reported tampering. It used an infrared beam in the locking mechanism to detect
tampering. If someone removed the bracelet, the beam would be broken and officers
would be alerted. The problem was that they weren't all that great and actually
quite fragile, and alerts were going off all the time. Too many alerts
to respond to, especially when a lot of them were false alarms. Probation
Officer Mark Walker called the manufacturer in twenty ten asking for advice because you had
actually another one coals but I hadn't come. My officers are getting liability.
Oh yeah, yep. I don't know what what to do here? What
what I did for another district. Because these are fiber optics. I put
in a parameter for the open closed step. You know, if they don't
restore in three minutes or five minutes, but then they would be notified.
Then I put some in for five minutes. Yeah, okay, even mine
that after maybe winkenses the steps figured out, maybe you might want to take
out that five minute buffer. Now those on probation were not aware of this,
but what that five minute buffer meant was that there would not be an
alert sent to officers unless the infrared beam was broken for longer than five minutes.
Typically, an alert would be sent anytime the beam was broken. Of
course, after Renz's arrest, Mark Walker called the manufacturer back to figure out
how this could have happened. It's a smart Walker, give me your curvation.
Um, I think it's Persasi. Let you know. Unfortunately we had
a Panama and they couldn't no bree want um. David wren he's a lunch
committed a murder at a rape. I'm just trying to I guess reason trying
to evaluate what happened here is he could have you know, little those ten
when you get them out, and then my fine might have been wooing them
out, put him back in and away he went. Looks like this guy
probably disconnected reconnected it within a minute, and that's why it was the delay.
And yeah, I think it's the small possibilities that what he could have
done it was to um back or something. Yeah, I mean anything that
would hold out. I mean even if you could squeeze it close enough,
and you know sometimes you don't know actually need the pen to keep it clothe.
Even if he did that, it wouldn't have to have a pack in
it, just so the light goes through that back. I mean, you
could set a two sick pen. Whatever the ort to begin family to the
actual pans you mention to put that back in right, anything that holds that
buckle cloth over the lights through. In an attempt to mitigate false alarms,
they had extended the amount of time before a tempor alert was sent to probation
officers. In theory, an offender with determination could disassemble the ankle monitor,
remove it from their leg, and reassemble it without alerting the authorities, as
long as they did it under five minutes. And that is exactly what Rens
did, just not at first. It all started on his release date.
When he was first outfitted with the monitor. When this was device was first
put on your ankle, were you able to watch him do it? Yes?
You would think that you wouldn't let someone you were trying to track watch
exactly how to install the monitor, but they did a short time later,
Rens accidentally damaged the device. The next morning they called the provision department,
sofish mister Aflano told him the events who told me to come into the office
to get it basically retired, which I did. I stepped in a narrow
place and got it caught mister Traflano make a repair. Yes, did you
watch him do it? Yes. After witnessing the installation and repair of the
GPS monitor, this computer science major started trying to figure out how to disassemble
it himself. He couldn't work, so he had a lot of time to
figure it out while his mother was at work. The first time was just
a test. Did you ever receive a call from the federal government the US
Probation Department? After his successful first attempt, he began doing it more and
more. When you went into Walmart to purchase the air pistol on February twenty
eight, two, thousand and thirteen. Were you wearing the ankle bracelet that
was not Where was the ankle bracelet located? It was located at my house.
You purchased these items that we've marked, the receipts, the zip ties,
the tights or pantyhose. I think you called them before March fourteen,
twenty thirteen. Correct, credit those items. They were all involved in the
commission of the crimes. Were here about? Correct? Paul were purchased without
his monitor. The more he did it, the more he did the system,
and the more the system failed. How many times in total would you
say that you took the bracelet off? I can only did enough in it,
but I think probably tend to a doesn't Did you feel that you could
take the bracelet off whenever you wanted to and not risk having Probation call you.
Yes. His only worry was how long he could go with it off.
Alerts were also sent if the device was stationary for too long. Since
I didn't know after a limit, I kept it too as short a time
as possible. Even with this unknown limit, Rens began living at his leisure.
Was there any role that Probation played by the fact that they were not
contacting you when the tampers would happen, or anything like that that embolden you
to go forward with what eventually happened on March fourteenth, I would say yes,
because of the lack of hers thoughts to certain actions that I knew that
or assumed anyways that there was, I had greater freedom. He felt he
had greater freedom. When the probation officers checked the temper alerts that were less
than five minutes, Rens had nearly fifty. And when they found his reassembled
monitor at his home, it was held together with an oversized screw and duct
tape. David Rens had been caught trying to fulfill his sick fantasy, the
one he fostered through violent child pornography, all because he thought he could get
away with it, even under the watchful eye of probation officers. The only
questions that remained were how he would plead and whether or not he would get
the death penalty or just life in prison. On Large Soldiers Shows Down thirteen
imploy nine years old, drilled my car into the parking lot of the Great
Order Wall and the town of play On and IgA tell me there I left
my car and entered into another car pus by Lawyer Drives in hand and a
ten year old Tunld child. I shrikened both of theocutants of the car,
which the tallest gun that looks like a real handgun, and directing Lawyer Dress
to hand to drive to a remote loth park and parking lot. Once there,
I restrained both Lorie Drives to hand and the child's hands without their consent,
so that they could not escape or resist. I used it nice to
cut a hole and the child's clothing and proceeded to head ton instu Vagina's sexually
enforce art. Immediately after, I drove the car out of the mall parking
lot and eventually ended up on her plank road in the town play und dot
is becoming under plane road. I intentionally caused a dash with Lorie Dress to
hand, but I repeatedly stauting here in the head chest which are nice,
and attacking the strained older while she was restrained. I do not fully understand
what legend to conditus crimes the lusion as I did. An explanation is not
in justification, nor has it less of my responsibilities for what I had done.
I am truly sorry. For my actions, and I am prepared to
accept a constquesss Toora. I also advise he is guilty, I will be
able to bring a closure to a victim and their family, and stared on
to reveal on the trial. He pleaded guilty to avoid trial and spare young
Jane Doe and the rest of the Bresnahan family the trauma of reliving that event.
It was a generous play, even though he claimed he didn't know why
he actually carried it out. He could have pleaded not guilty and made everyone
involved go to trial, but he knew that his only chance set life in
prison rather than death was to throw himself at the mercy of the court.
As mother Kathleen emotionally expressed her remorse for what had happened because of her son.
My heart goes out to the prisoner hand family. We are praying for
God's comfort, healing and restoration for everyone who's been affected by this tragic event,
especially the young girl. I pray that your hearts will be filled with
God's peace. Phaps is all understanding, and his lawyer reinforced that sentiment.
His family is remorseful. He is remorseful, and this is a terrible event,
and that's our whole goal here, is to demonstrate that he's remorseful for
what happened. We're hopeful that they'll see that it's not necessary that mister Wrens
will be in prison for the rest of his life, and that trying to
seek the death penalty for this event is as real purpose. When people saw
Wrens in court, they couldn't imagine how he could be responsible, even though
they knew he was. I did get to know it him, and I
got to interview and learn about a lot of other people who've known David for
a long time, and as I got to know him, I understood why
anyone I talked to about him were shocked by the activity this conduct of this
day was not what most people thought. David Rens. You know, I
do have this feeling of you're kidding me. This is the guy that committed
this horrible, horrible act, cause so much heartache for Laurie's family, and
has scarred this little girl for the rest of her life, and you know,
has affected everybody in this community. Nobody's ever going to go to a
place with their daughter at them all the same way for the foreseeable future.
And you look at him, I don't know what does he five for.
He's obviously has some serious physical disfigurement. It just doesn't It's almost beyond description.
I think that when you have someone who's as evil as that individual,
I mean, I don't think it really matters if you're five foot four or
six foot four, or two hundred pounds or one hundred pounds. I mean,
when you're that committed to commit such heinous acts, you're going to do
whatever you can, no matter what you're building. Child pornography is clearly becoming
an epidemic in our country, and we need to wake up. Everything learned
about Rends would be taken into consideration at a sentencing, but also all the
pain he caused. Thoughts of Laurie's loving spirit warm my heart. But the
picture of Laurie's smile means you're smile eyes every time I see it. His
act was so horrendous that Judge confessed his trust in God was shaken. I
think people are still struggling to understand. We're explaining unimaginable horror. Do you
quite obviously upon to the sailing, solve the little rules innocence and you rob
her or youth. A thirty year old veteran court reporter who happened to be
Laurie's cousin, said, for the first time in his career, did he
truly understand the pain of victims families? This today closed the book on a
criminal court proceeding. It doesn't provide one iota of closure for the sorrow and
the grief that we're going through, and I'm not sure that that that'll ever
go away. Frends would be sentenced to life in prison without parole, and
because he waved his right to appeal, that would be forever his fate.
I just want to say that we're really glad that a final decision was made
and that we're pleased with the decision to not pursue the death penalty. It's
a great Britain lifted, you know, not only for the sake of my
son, but more importantly for Jindo who now won't have to testify and relive
that perfixx cerience. I want to say that it's been brought to a close
as far as State Court is concerned. The defendant has waived appeal. He
will be sentenced to life without parole. There is no equivocation about that.
There's there's no games, there's no gimmicks, there's no way he can ever
appear in front of a parole board. He will come out of prison in
a pine box. Little Jane was well taken care of. After that,
the Presdenthan family filed a lawsuit against the US government for their clear lack of
due diligence and was awarded a five million dollars settlement. Three point seven million
dollars went into a trust for Little Jane. Right now, she is surrounded
by an incredibly nurturing, loving, supportive environment. There are numerous people,
some of whom were in court this morning, that love her and are caring
for her, making sure that she gets proper counseling if necessary. I am
told that she's very, very energetic, that she's resilient, that she is
one incredible, resilient, bright, tough individual. And I would be remiss
if I didn't mention to the people in this room. I know that most
of you, if not all of you, know who she is. And
I don't know that another community's media would have reacted this way, that somebody
might have tried to sneak up on her and get a picture or an interview.
You have been very, very fastidious in protecting her identity, and I
appreciate that very much. And I think she'll I think she'll do okay.
I think she'll do okay. Now, over ten years later, she is
more than twenty years old, and this whole time Bill has been fighting to
keep his promise to Laurie and make sure nothing like this ever happens again.
If you remember where you were on March fourteenth, as the scrolls on the
bottom of the news or your show or whatever you were watching talk about carjacking
and clay, or you watch the eleven o'clock news and you see how bad
this is, and then the next day you hear even how much worse it
is, and then the file following days you hear how horrific and heinous this
was. I think Laurie deserves to know why an individual like this was given
an electric monitoring device. And also, what could is a program like that
if you're going to have forty six alerts go off? What could is a
program like that if you're not going to follow up on it. If the
alerts were sent and the probation officers would have done their job, they would
have even checked on them at his house. I'm not even saying that night
that they could put an electric fence around this man, but they would have
seen that that device had been tampered with. What I want from state lawmakers
is I want them to provide an opportunity for district attorney's offices judges to be
able in certain cases. We're not going to broad brush everybody, but in
cases of sexual offenders violent crimes, they should have the right to call up
your family courts where these are sealed, and say does this Does this individual
have this type of offense in their background? And until we as a community
together push this agenda Ford, it may go on deaf ears and and we
can't let that happen. Bill is still advocating for change and how the government
handles pre trial release. Unfortunately, Trooper Sikora, who had become friends with
Bill, never got to see this progress. He retired in twenty seventeen,
and in twenty nineteen he succumbed to lung cancer he developed after his exposure at
Ground Zero. David Rens was sick and had been from a young age.
His obsession for child pornography, likely stemming from what can be assumed was his
only sexual encounter when he molested a nine year old, fueled his unrequited urges
as an adult. Sure he was otherwise a good student and a decent employee,
but only because he kept the darkest part of him secret from everyone.
If the courts had been allowed to see his sealed juvenile record, maybe he
would have not been given probation. If the probation office had paid attention to
the alerts and checked on him, maybe he would have never entertained the idea.
But they didn't because of laziness. If the ankle monitor manufacturer had focused
on building a decent product instead of the cheapest one they could for the most
profit, perhaps none of this would have happened, but they didn't because of
and competence. David Wrens said he did what he did only because he thought
he could get away with it, but we all know better than that.
David Wrens was a monster all along, and the only reason he did what
he did was because we as a society allowed him to. All Right,
that's gonna do it. If you like the show, join plus Swordenscale dot
com slash plus. If you don't fuck off and stay safe, Hey,
Mike, I just wanted to let you know that I definitely enjoy your little
opinions that you describe throughout the shows. Don't listen to these dorks that call
and complain about it because they have literally every other true crime podcast to listen
to if they want their little opinions echoed. They also have the corporate media
and the stupid government to agree with them. So let us have this one
podcast and use his best. Thank you right,