Texas Man Accused of Murdering Sons, Sends Mom Photo of Boy Hanged

[udbcrzy2]

Source: ABC News

A Texas man allegedly killed his two young sons and then sent gruesome photos of the dead children to their mother, including a picture of the toddler hanged.

Gabriel Armandariz is facing capital murder charges and is being held on $1.5 million bond.

He was charged after police in Graham, Texas, police found the bodies of Armandariz's 2-year-old son, Gatlin, and 6-month- old Luke on Thursday morning.

Armandariz, 28, started sending menacing text messages to his ex-girlfriend, Lauren Smith, at the beginning of the week, friends said.

Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/US/texas-man-gabriel-armandariz-accused-killing-sons-sending/story?id=13385026

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Sick bastard!

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Drale]

2. My faith that the death penalty is wrong is severely shaken

when ever I read a story like this.

[hlthe2b]

3. ditto... ESPECIALLY in this case...

OMG...

[plumbob]

4. I do favor a carefully administered, limited death penalty just for cases

like this.

Maximum appeals, DNA evidence, careful trial by expert prosecutors and defenders.

Then, when we are absolutely sure, they're gone.

[blueamy66]

32. I agree with you wholeheartedly.

this is a perfect case for the DP

[Xithras]

5. My faith that cruel and unusual punishment is wrong is severely shaken...

whenever I read a story like this.

Luckily, that's why our government doesn't allow us to make these decisions in the heat of the moment.

[FiveGoodMen]

11. Agreed on all points.

[moriah]

30. Bingo. n/t

[roguevalley]

12. how far from the grace of god do you have to fall to hang a baby

and then show the pictures to their mother? Oh my god. Oh my god.

[leftynyc]

15. I hear ya

But I wont be crying when they pour poison into this motherfucker.

[shanti]

6. wow

evil should be this animal's name!

[Burma Jones]

7. Texas eh?

Well, we know the eventual fate of Mr. Armandariz.......


I have no problem with that. Maybe I'm one of those less tolerant Liberals........

[Maine-ah]

8. I'm a less tolerant liberal

when it comes to cases like this.

[Snoutport]

10. crimes against children...and the added cruelty of what he did with the pictures.

life in prison taking classes and hanging out with his jail buddies is not justice in this case.

[moriah]

31. There can be no true justice in a case like this.

And death is too easy of a punishment IMHO. As another poster said, these are the cases where my stance against cruel and unusual punishment starts getting shaken.

[get the red out]

13. +1

I know I am one of those less tolerant liberals every time I read a story like this one. And it doesn't even bother me that I am!

[reggie the dog]

20. and if he is being framed by a crooked cop

who is in love with the woman?

the death penalty is wrong, you can let a framed person out of jail, you cannot bring an executed person back to life.

[TheMadMonk]

25. Would you also posit that said cop did the deed to the kids?

Set the bar in DP cases to "Beyond all possible doubt."

Sometime there is absolutely no element of doubt over who did what and with which and to whom.

And ALWAYS make the penalty for deliberate police/prosecutorial misconduct equal to the sentence(s) handed down as a result of that misconduct, with no possibility for sentence reduction. Oh and get busted mid-trial, collect the maximum possible automatically. After all, stupidity in perfidity deserves its own special reward.

[reggie the dog]

59. too many innocent people have been sentenced to death

for me to accept it. in principal i agree that society could do without certain monsters but i just dont trust any justice system enough to be 100% accurate

[SOS]

60. The Supreme Court recently upheld prosecutorial misconduct

From the NYT op-ed page:

The Prosecution Rests, But I Can't

"I spent 18 years in prison for robbery and murder, 14 of them on death row. I’ve been free since 2003, exonerated after evidence covered up by prosecutors surfaced just weeks before my execution date. Those prosecutors were never punished. Last month, the Supreme Court decided 5-4 to overturn a case I’d won against them and the district attorney who oversaw my case, ruling that they were not liable for the failure to turn over that evidence — which included proof that blood at the robbery scene wasn’t mine.

Because of that, prosecutors are free to do the same thing to someone else today.

A crime was definitely committed in this case, but not by me.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/10/opinion/10thompson.html

Prosecutors who commit crimes against innocent Americans cannot be held liable for their crimes, thanks to the Roberts court.

[cali]

9. oh fuck. fuck. fuck. fuck. fuck.

this really tests my anti-dp convictions.

[Bucky]

14. Not mine. He's a sick fuck and it gladdens me to think of him rotting behind bars for decades.

I have no interest in revenge; it solves nothing so it doesn't satisfy me. But punishment; a life time of coming to see what a shit he is... that seems only fair to me.

[cali]

16. um, I hate to point this out to you but your post reeks of vengefulness.

far more than mine does.

[Bucky]

18. That's emotional projection. I was quite calm when I typed it.

Anyway, my larger point is that if you get hate out of your heart, you won't feel tempted to make comments like "I'm re-thinking my philosophy on capital punishment based on my entirely predictable emotional reaction to one particular case."

My position may not be dispassionate, but at least it stands up to real world situations.

[cali]

29. uh, "it gladdens me to think of him rotting behind bars"

enough said.

[leftynyc]

17. Some people

simply don't deserve to breath.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

23. I don't see it that way

This man deserves to breath for a very long time. While he sits in prison thinking about what he did to those two little boys over and over again. That's the closest thing to justice there is in a case such as this.

[leftynyc]

27. We don't even know if he's sorry for what he did.

He sounds like a psychopath. What if he has no capacity for remorse? Such people do exist.

[whatchamacallit]

19. I just wanna cry (nt)

[Rex]

21. W T F

Ugh...my state, AGAIN. :facefuckingpalmnotenoughinthissituation:

I can only hope he dies for his crimes. Don't let him rot on deathrow.

[uppityperson]

22. Those poor kids. eom

[Horse with no Name]

24. I saw this on the news last night

But they didn't release details of the killings at that time. Very sad.

[Liberal_in_LA]

26. ugh. really horrible

[dems_rightnow]

28. If they draw and quarter him

.... I'm against it, but I'm busy the day of the protest.

[blueamy66]

33. if someone did this to one of my nephews....

God help me, cause I'd go crazy on them

what cute little guys....wanna cry

[LAGC]

34. All you people arguing for the Death Penalty in this case...

Keep in mind, Texas has put more people to death than any other state in the nation.

Obviously, it's not a deterrent to crimes like this. In fact, it may enable some of these crimes, by people who want to die but are too cowardly to end their lives themselves.

So why bother?

It's still more expensive to go through all the appeals than just let the sorry sucker rot in solitary confinement (since he'll never last long in general population once they hear about what he apparently did) for the rest of his natural life.

[plumbob]

35. It is the perfect deterrent to him committing any more crimes, isn't it?

No idea why the cost of appeals would exceed the cost of confinement, since he's entitled to the same appeals on death or life.

When Texas is laying off 100,000 teachers because corporations don't pay enough taxes, I'm against spending $65k+ a year to confine folks like this. That's a fully qualified multi-degreed teacher who can do some good for thousands of learners over the years. Not hard for me to make the decision.

If you had a rabid dog, even one you loved, would you just watch it die slowly and always with the chance that the dog could spread the disease to another, or would you have it put down mercifully and painlessly?

[LAGC]

38. $65K? Even California's "posh" prison system only costs $45K per convict.

You must have some luxurious suites for your state's prisoners.

Don't forget that the appeals process takes many years, so even then you're paying to house the perp on Death Row just as you would be on a life sentence.

"The Sacramento Bee found that the death penalty costs California $90 million annually beyond the ordinary costs of the justice system - $78 million of that total is incurred at the trial level.10 Since California has averaged much less than one execution per year, the costs per execution are astronomical, approaching $100 million per execution. Recently, the governor of California requested an additional $220 million from the legislature to construct a new death row."
Source(s):
Testimony of Richard C. Dieter, Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center

S. Maganini, "Closing Death Row Would Save State $90 Million a Year," Sacramento Bee, March 28, 1988, at 1.

Unless you think the appeals process should be streamlined, which could result in more innocents being erroneously put to death.

To me, even one erroneous state-sponsored killing is unacceptable. As you can never take it back.

[plumbob]

42. I specified no streamlining. I want maximum appeals, expert defense

and prosecutors, all possible evidence, including DNA.

The dollar cost is pennies for any group of offenders, because the budget for Texas Department of Criminal Justice is a little over $3 billion per year. So a hundred million of so would not amount to 2 or 3%, well within the margin of error of most statistics.

We do have other killings that are the fault of the state - for instance, when we give a drunk driver probation, and they then kill someone while driving drunk again, or in the case of a local rapist, he was released from a 20 year sentence in 3 years. He took the bus from Palestine, Texas, where he was released to his ex-girlfriend's town. He showed up the same day at her workplace and killed her and a security guard placed there for her protection when his release was revealed.

No one much worries about these, though, even though there are thousands of them a year, unless you want to believe that the 16,000+ who were killed last year by drunks were run over by persons with no previous record.

I'm willing to take great precautions to save accused's lives, but I wish we would also spend a little time on the truly innocent victims of those guilty parties walking around at loose ends.

[cliffordu]

36. GENE POOL'S CLOSED. TIME TO GO.

I think a nice slow drawn and quartered end for this prick would be fine sport.

Or just make him serve his time in the general population of any maximum security prison.

No administrative segregation.

[blueamy66]

70. Amen. No ad seg

Actually, the guards should posts pics of what he did to his 2 babies so the gen pop can see them.

What a waste of human breath.

[chatnoir]

37. Man confessed killing children, police say

Associated Press / April 16, 2011

GRAHAM, Texas — A man accused of killing his two sons called 911 and confessed about 10 hours before the infant and toddler were found dead under their home, according to police documents released yesterday.

Graham police started investigating Gabriel Armandariz, 28, after one of his sisters called Wednesday and reported seeing a picture from his cellphone that showed the infant hanging by the neck, according to an arrest warrant affidavit obtained by Associated Press.

A man called 911 later that day and confessed to killing his children, and authorities verified that the call came from Armandariz’s cellphone, police said. An overnight search ended when the bodies of Gatlin, 2, and baby Luke were found under their home early Thursday, according to the documents.

From: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2011/04/16/man_confessed_killing_children_police_say/

---------------------------------------

So he kills his own baby and toddler, then sends around pics from his cellphone of the deed? WTF?? I have absolutely no words anymore for these acts... :(

[WatsonT]

39. Clearly he had mental issues, and was likely facing abuse at the hands of the mother

I hope she is charged as well. Or at least investigated.

No father would just kill his children for evil or selfish reasons.

[plumbob]

43. Oh? Take another look:

http://www.ktla.com/news/landing/ktla-san-bernardino-family-stabbing,0,3312932.story

SAN BERNARDINO (KTLA) -- A 35-year-old father accused of killing his teenage son and torturing his wife and four other children appeared in San Bernardino Superior Court Wednesday morning....

According to a police report, Roderiquez beat his wife and children repeatedly with a monkey wrench, forced them to walk on broken glass and threatened to set them on fire during the 11-hour ordeal...

His eldest son, 16-year-old Richard was beaten so badly he died....

According to police, Roderiquez accused his family of stealing his drugs and then proceeded to attack, beat and torture them for 11 hours.

[WatsonT]

48. Yes another example of our failed mental health facilities

if he'd been given the help he needed he never would have fallen through the cracks like that.

He's as much the victim as anyone.

[plumbob]

44. Or perhaps?

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/06/17/national/main702782.shtml

Dad Guilty Of Killing His 9 Kids
Domineering Father Of Large, Incestuous Clan Found Guilty Of Murder

(AP) Marcus Wesson, the domineering patriarch of a large and incestuous clan, was convicted Friday of murdering nine of his children, whose bodies were found in a bloody pile last year at the end of a police standoff.

Wesson, 58, could get the death penalty.

The jury took more than two weeks to find Wesson guilty on nine counts of first-degree murder. He was also convicted on all 14 counts of raping and molesting seven of his underage daughters and nieces....

[WatsonT]

49. Likely he was abused as a child

not his fault.

[plumbob]

45. Or perhaps this poor man who was so abused that his wife had to live

in a battered women's shelter.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=11676374

Texas Father Accused of Killing His 3 Children
Attorney: Texas man accused of killing his 3 children previously threatened to kill himself


A Texas father accused of shooting his three children to death as they slept had previously threatened to kill or hurt himself if he lost visitation rights, an attorney said...

After Mohammed Goher's two daughters, ages 14 and 7, and a 12-year-old son were killed Sunday, authorities said Goher shot himself in the mouth in an apparent suicide attempt. He was in fair condition Monday at Ben Taub Hospital, a hospital spokeswoman said...

He is divorced from the children's mother, Norma Goher, but had court-ordered visitation rights, according to the statement. Records show he was convicted in 2006 of beating his wife, who lived in a shelter for battered women.

The father's visitation rights were to be the subject of a court hearing in Houston later this month. Syed Izfar, appointed by the court to represent the children in the hearing, told the Houston Chronicle he was going to suggest Goher receive standard visitation.

[WatsonT]

46. Ahem

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=901856&mesg_id=901856

[plumbob]

47. And for an international flavor, consider

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1367534/River-deaths-Father-Christopher-Grady-guilty-killing-daughter-driving-car-Avon.html

Police were warned SIX times about father who killed daughter, five, by driving his car into the river after row with ex

Police received six separate calls in the weeks before a father killed his five-year-old daughter by driving into an icy river after a row with his former partner.

Christopher Grady, who was convicted of her murder and of attempting to murder his six-year-old son Ryan. He is expected to be handed a life sentence next week.
However, according to The Telegraph, officers were contacted six times prior to the tragedy by members of the little girl's family.

[WatsonT]

51. Yes, after a fight with his partner

likely she was abusive and is responsible for his feelings of desperation and depression.

[niyad]

56. you know, I would say, welcome to DU but for your apparent determination to excuse all the men cited

in these heinous crimes because they were, in all likelihood, abused by the women in their lives. curious, to say the least.

[niyad]

57. do you also excuse women who had a fight with their partners --since they, too, must have had

feelings of desperation and depression?

[WatsonT]

62. Heh

the irony is strong with this one.

Many people do exactly that for women, then fly off the handle and demand increasingly harsher sentences for men who murder their children.

You do see the double standard, yes?

Check out the other thread about a women who murdered her kids where people made the *EXACT SAME STATEMENTS* defending her that I used here.

And yet when you apply that same standard to men people lose it and get furious.

Not merely disagreeing with you but literally angry that you would dare point out that mental health/abuse may be a factor.

Double standard.

That was almost too easy to prove.

[niyad]

65. "people lose it and get furious" wow, project much?? too easy.

[WatsonT]

68. There were 8 responses

to my post within a short period of time.

I don't know what you call that.

[niyad]

58. still waiting for your response

[WatsonT]

61. Really, all of 15 minutes without a response and you start to get pissy?

Anyway, look at the link I posted to another thread on here.

You kinda supported the theory nicely.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=901856&mesg_id=901856

[WatsonT]

64. Still waiting for your response

[niyad]

66. same as above

[WatsonT]

67. Which was pretty vague

do you not recognize the double standard, or do you not care? Or do you believe that men are inherently evil but women are not capable of violence?

[plumbob]

50. Just Google father convicted of killing his own children for more than 5 million hits.

If 1/10 of 1% of those hits work out, then 5,000 children were killed by their fathers for evil or selfish reasons.

Of course, you would be 99.9% right, in that case.

The words "no" or "none" or "never" are very large qualifiers when you're talking human behavior.

[WatsonT]

52. Are you really not seeing the double standard here?

I thought it was pretty blatant.

[plumbob]

53. Your thinking is flawed. Google "mother convicted of killing her children"

and you get the same 5,000,000+ hits that you will get from "father convicted of killing his children."

Your other posts are fact-free, with only the wildest speculation of each tragedy.

But I can say this: if I'm feeling homicidal someday, I'm gonna move to your town, get you on the jury and walk, walk, walk every time I feel oppressed, abused, unhappy, picked on, or depressed.

No use continuing this conversation, because it isn't one. You have no interest in looking at the actual statistics readily discernible in seconds. So have a nice life, and remember, if someone you love is killed, they deserved it for being so mean, stingy with mental health care, or just downright argumentative.

[WatsonT]

54. Check out this thread

then realize that you exactly proved that posters point.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=901856&mesg_id=901856

Women murders her kid: blames goes to the system for not helping her or the obviously abusive boyfriend/husband (he must be defective because otherwise she wouldn't have done this).

Man does the same: let him rot in jail/be tortured to death.

Perfectly illustrated that point. Thank you.

[chatnoir]

40. Heartbreaking --Daily Mail has the shots of the kids before he did it

Apparently he posted them to his FB as well? WTF...

[Keith Bee]

41. Now THAT's a values voter!

:sarcasm:

[Initech]

55. How is this not terrorism?

[WatsonT]

63. No religious, political, or ideological goal

just simple vengeance and sadism.

[cali]

69. in every possible way

this has zilch to do with terrorism- what next calling drunk drivers terrorists?