Daily Archives: March 22, 2012

Man Mandated to Alcoholics Anonymous When a Minor- Murders His Grandfather

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When Kenneth Wilkinson, 22 was a minor he was mandated to Alcoholics Anonymous for 60 days. With the court not allowing him to drive until he was 21 also put pressure on the youth. How do you get to 60 AA Meetings when you can’t drive?

For reasons unknown, this man dragged his 84 year old grandfather who had Alzheimer’s, behind his truck for 6 miles to his death. One can’t help but feel that maybe sending a minor to AA meetings was NOT what this boy needed. He did not go to all of the AA meetings. Most minors do not feel comfortable with the message of powerlessness, or the fact that most participants are much older. Yet some courts are sending minors to AA and NA meetings, even though they have no meetings specifically for them.

Willits man charged with murder appears in court
By TIFFANY REVELLE The Daily Journal
Updated: 03/21/2012 02:11:59 PM PDT

Kenneth Wilkinson, 22, was in Mendocino County Superior Court today to be arraigned on a murder charge and a special allegation that he tortured his grandfather, Richard Mel Wilkinson, 84. Reliable sources said Tuesday that the younger Wilkinson allegedly killed his grandfather by dragging him behind a truck for nearly six miles Saturday night while left to care for him for a few hours, possibly in a drug-induced psychosis. “He’s not a violent person,” Kenneth Wilkinson’s mother, Kris Pearce, said outside the courtroom Wednesday while waiting for the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Department to transport her son from county jail for his court appearance. “This is completely out of character for him.” Public Defender Linda Thompson took the case and said she needed a week to prepare for the young man’s arraignment, which was rescheduled for 8:30 a.m. March 29 in courtroom A. He remains at the jail under a no-bail hold in the meantime.

Pearce said her son had never been diagnosed with a mental illness but had struggled emotionally throughout his life, having been picked on at school as the “skinny kid.” As an adult, he had a drug and alcohol problem, but said his drinking wasn’t heavy, according to Pearce.

Kenneth had been in court in 2008 for an allegation that he had possessed alcohol as a minor, and had been put on a deferred judgment plan. The arrangement meant the charge would be dropped on the condition that he attend 60 days of Alcoholics Anonymous meetings

in the year’s length of the plan, but according to the Mendocino County Superior Court, he didn’t comply. Pearce said that sent him into a “vicious cycle,” where he could not get a driver’s license until he was 21, making it hard for him to get a job and take care of his court obligations.

http://www.ukiahdailyjournal.com/ci_20223569/man-accused-killing-grandfather-court

Alcoholics Anonymous Member’s Husband Arrested In Her Murder

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AA member Nicole Pietz, was 8 years sober when she was brtually murdered 5 years ago. Her Husband was arrested for 2nd degree

Nicole Pietz Murder Scene

Husband of Nicole Pietz charged with second-degree murder
By KOMO Staff Published: Mar 21, 2012

SEATTLE — Prosecutors have charged the husband of murder victim Nicole Pietz more than five years after her death. Martin “David” Piez has been charged with second-degree murder. He is being held on $1 million bail.

The 33-year-old Lynnwood woman disappeared in Jan. 28, 2006 after leaving home. A week later, a hiker found her body in Burien, dumped in a field of overgrown blackberry bushes. Two weeks later, her car was discovered at a parking lot in Seattle’s University District.An autopsy revealed Nicole Pietz had been strangled, but her killer was never found.

David Pietz, who was the last person to see his wife alive, had said that when he woke up around 8:20 a.m. on Jan. 28, 2006, his wife had already left. But forensic evidence showed Nicole Pietz likely died around midnight the morning of Jan. 28 — a time when David Pietz claimed his wife was asleep in their bed, investigators said.

David Pietz also failed a polygraph test, and when detectives asked him to retake the test, he refused and hired an attorney. A search of Nicole Pietz’s car turned up DNA evidence belonging to both David Pietz and his wife, “but Nicole’s DNA was in very small quantities, while the defendant’s DNA was in much greater quantities,” investigators wrote.

The couple had financial problems and the marriage was “in some degree of turmoil,” the document said, adding David Pietz had extramarital affairs and tried to get other women to join him and his wife in bed.

Detectives added David Pietz had conducted an Internet search on his computer for swinger’s clubs as well as ways to cheat on one’s spouse. And just weeks after his wife’s death, he began looking for phone numbers of women to date.

The victim’s mother, Gael Schneider, said news of the arrest brought her tremendous relief.

“I can’t even tell you, I’m so elated,” she said. “My stomach was just like it has bees in it. And (I was) thanking God over and over, and over for finally granting this prayer to me.”

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Nicole Pietz’s body was found without the wedding ring she always wore, her mother said. There was nothing under her nails indicating a struggle, and she was wearing the night guard she wore to bed. Schneider added her daughter was headed to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.

“I don’t think she’d be wearing a night guard going to her 8-year sobriety meeting,” said Schneider. “She would have been dressed to kill.”

“When I heard about all his affairs and just the way he had been treating her in public…and Nicci was going for her 8-year sobriety coin the next year, but he was always suggesting they go to places where there was alcohol, which made her crazy,” she said.

http://www.komonews.com/news/local/Nicole-Pietz-143687986.html