Rogue's Den of Iniquity - Atrocities: Story #13

He said it was revenge because Amy, before they were married, had refused to cut short a vacation trip to comfort him when his father died in 1996. "Shanabarger said he planned to make Amy feel the way he did when his father died. He married her, got her pregnant, allowed time for her to bond with the child, and then took his (boy's) life," according to an affidavit prosecutors filed to support a murder charge.

Shanabarger, 30, who begged officers to shoot him after he confessed last Wednesday, is being held without bail pending a court appearance Monday for an initial hearing. An attorney will be appointed for him at the hearing. Johnson County Prosecutor Lance Hamner said he hasn't decided whether to seek the death penalty.

Shanabarger said in his confession that on the evening of June 19, he wrapped plastic wrap around his son's head and face, then left the boy's nursery to get something to eat and brush his teeth. Twenty minutes later, he said, he returned, removed the plastic and placed Tyler face down in the crib before he went off to bed. Amy Shanabarger, 29, had been working that night at her job as a cashier at a grocery store. When she came home she went straight to bed, assuming that Tyler was asleep, and found the boy's body the next morning. Shanabarger, who worked at a tire-retreading center, told police he confessed because of the image of his son's face, flat and purplish from rigor mortis. Since then, he's confessed at least three times, Police Chief Harry Furrer said in an interview Sunday. Each time, the story has been the same - that he hatched his plan because he was enraged by his then-girlfriend's refusal to cut short a cruise and return home after his father's death in October 1996. The Shanabargers were married the following May.

Detectives who have interviewed relatives confirmed that Shanabarger had long resented Amy's refusal to cut the cruise short, Furrer said. "Their statements substantiate his confession," he said. The Rev. Randy Maynard, a volunteer chaplain for Franklin police, accompanied police to the couple's home in this town south of Indianapolis on Father's Day. While most parents of children who die from SIDS are weeping and consoling each other when authorities arrive, Maynard said Shanabarger was cold, distant and offering no comfort to his sobbing wife. And after Amy Shanabarger's parents arrived later that morning, Maynard said Ronald Shanabarger gave his father-in-law a gift-wrapped commemorative knife as a Father's Day present. "That really struck me as odd," Maynard said. Maynard said he's still troubled by the image of Tyler's tiny face. "He was a beautiful boy, even in death, he was just the most beautiful boy. I'm still getting goose bumps thinking about this guy."

Shanabarger's father-in-law, Robert Parsons, wears a tiny gold cherub pin to remind him of his grandson. He won't discuss his son-in-law, but says his daughter, an only child, is devastated. "He was a little boy, he played, he laughed, he loved. We loved him dearly and that's what this is all about," said Parsons, 52. "We don't want vengeance, but we do want justice."

Neil S. Kaye, a forensic psychiatrist who specializes in investigating infanticide cases committed by fathers, said he's never heard of a similar crime. "A lot of times people say this or that crime was just too complicated of a plan to be anything other than a sign of pure wickedness," said Kaye, of Wilmington, Del. "But science would say otherwise, that this man was delusional and you have to wonder about his overall mental state, his mental capacity."

Past Stories:

Man pleads guilty to smothering baby so he could listen to Garth Brooks
Dentist wanted for allegedly abusing and photographing patients
Neighborhood wonders how tragedy slipped through the cracks
Man found guilty of strangling granddaughter for licking cupcakes
Holocaust-themed abortion protest elicits violence from students
Mom who had manicure while baby starved sentenced to 4 years in prison
Abused Florida toddler dies after being taken off life support
Openly gay student beaten, left to die in Wyoming attack
Two brothers charged, with mother, in 6-year-old's beating death in S.C.
Louisiana becomes a battleground for 14-year-old boy in church detention center
Two college athletes charged in beating death of homeless man
Convicted child abusers allegedly molest kids after regaining custody
Florida teens charged with killing father's girlfriend
Father confesses he conceived child with intent to kill
Quadriplegic jailed on pot charge could cost Georgians $660,000

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All Rants & Poetry on the Den of Iniquity are Copyrighted.
Use of these materials on other sites is strictly prohibited
unless you've received permission from Rogue
© 1996-2000 - Rogue

Tirades || Censorship || Body Modification || Pals || Halloween || Music || Links || BiPride || Voodoo || Literacy || Poetry || BDSM || Rogue Bits || Atrocity

All Rants & Poetry on the Den of Iniquity are Copyrighted. Use of these materials on other sites is strictly prohibited unless you've received permission from Rogue © 1996-2000 - Rogue

All Rants & Poetry on the Den of Iniquity are Copyrighted.
Use of these materials on other sites is strictly prohibited
unless you've received permission from Rogue
© 1996-2000 - Rogue