Written by Janet
Police still have no suspects and are urging extreme caution following the murder of seven people in a dingy mobile home Saturday on the site of a historic plantation in southeast Georgia. Glynn County Police Chief Matt Doering said during the second day of the investigation, that it was a horrific scene, unlike anything he’d seen in 25 years of law enforcement.
As investigators toll long hours and medical examiners take on the slow labor of performing autopsies on the deceased, Doering told reporters that police officials are working to piece together a baffling puzzle that has left them few clues to the motive for the murders.
The family member of some of the victims who called 911 Saturday morning after discovering the crime scene was arrested late last night on drug-related charges, though police said he was not a suspect in the killings.
Guy Heinze Jr., 22, a relative of those found killed, was charged with illegal possession of prescription drugs and marijuana, tampering with evidence and making false statements to police, Doering said. Doering did not know whether he had an attorney. Most of the victims were related to Rusty Toler, a poor resident of the New Hope Plantation trailer park nestled among centuries-old, moss-draped oak trees in Brunswick, Ga.
It’s reported that Toler and three of his children are among the dead. A fourth child is in critical condition in the hospital.
Investigators were talking to neighbors about whether they saw or heard anything unusual at the dingy mobile home shaded by large, moss-draped oaks with an old boat in the front yard. Police had not interviewed the survivors, who remained in critical condition Saturday night and may be the only witnesses.
All the bodies were tentatively identified by Saturday evening, with the eighth dying today. Doering said families of the victims had been notified, but he would not release any names or ages before receiving the autopsy results.
Located a few miles north of the port city of Brunswick, the mobile home park consists of about 100 spaces and is nestled among centuries-old live oak trees near the center of New Hope Plantation, according to the plantation’s Web site. The 1,100 acre tract is all that remains of a Crown grant made in 1763 to Henry Laurens, who later succeeded John Hancock as president of the Continental Congress in 1777.
Update:
Glynn County Police Chief Matt Doering identified the victim as 19-year-old Michael Toler. He was one of two people critically injured in the attacks in Brunswick along the Georgia coast. A ninth is hospitalized. The man who reported the gruesome slayings, originally of seven people, faces charges of lying to police and tampering with evidence, and authorities said they haven’t ruled him out as a suspect in the killings. The killer was not among the dead, whose bodies were found Saturday, or the last survivor, according to Doering.
Guy Heinze Jr., 22, was arrested late Saturday and also faces charges of illegal possession of prescription drugs and marijuana. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation began conducting autopsies Sunday. GBI spokesman John Bankhead said results would be released by Glynn County police, and Doering refused to comment, saying it could take two or three days for autopsies to be completed.
newsdeskinternational
/ 08/31/2009Georgia slayings 911 call: ‘My whole family’s dead’
In an anguished 911 call, a Georgia man told dispatchers he arrived home to find “my whole family’s dead.” “I just got home,” a man identified as Guy Heinze Jr. told the emergency dispatcher in the Saturday call, released Monday by authorities. “I was out last night. I got home just now, and everybody’s dead. … My whole family’s dead. It looks like they’ve been beaten to death.”
http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/08/31/georgia.killings/
CassidyRae
/ 08/31/2009I am wondering if he disturbed the crime scene….he said someone beat them, how would he know, if he just arrived home? He seems to know a bit too much about what happened imo…..
newsdeskinternational
/ 09/01/2009Arrested man denies trailer park slayings
22-year-old man jailed after reporting the slayings of eight family members in a Georgia trailer park had nothing to do with the killings, his attorney says.
http://www.upi.com/Top_News/2009/09/01/Arrested-man-denies-trailer-park-slayings/UPI-35951251820032/
newsdeskinternational
/ 09/01/20098 people slain in Ga. were ‘good country folks’
Rusty Toler Sr. took in people who were down on their luck, packing his mobile home with relatives and others who had lost their jobs or fallen on hard times.
Police have now identified the people killed:
Toler, his four children, two siblings and his daughter’s boyfriend were found slain. Ten people lived in the single-wide, 980-square-foot trailer in coastal Georgia that cost Toler $405 a month. Police have no suspects and have not said how the family died. The victims included 44-year-old Toler and his four children: Chrissy Toler, 22; Russell D. Toler Jr., 20; Michael Toler, 19; and Michelle Toler, 15.
Also killed were two of Toler’s siblings – Guy Heinze Sr., 45, and Brenda Gail Falagan, 49, as well as 30-year-old Joseph L. West, Chrissy Toler’s boyfriend. A ninth victim, whom police did not identify, remained in critical condition Tuesday.
A grieving Diane Isenhower, Toler Sr.’s ex-wife and mother to their four slain children, said she wants whoever killed them to pay.
Toler Sr. had worked for 20 years at a plant that dries chemicals and food products located behind the mobile home park, but was laid off several months ago, said Kathy Clock, administrative assistant to the owner of the plant and New Hope Plantation.
Montgomery said Toler Sr. also did odd jobs for her, including groundskeeping and hauling trailers.
But he had too many people living in the home. They were told more than two months ago they would have to move, which they planned to do.
Toler Sr. received notice of eviction proceedings Aug. 13 and was to have been in court with the landlord Monday, two days after he was killed. Montgomery said they had come to an agreement – the family had found a new place and promised to move out by Sept. 8.
newsdeskinternational
/ 09/02/2009Georgia Man Arrested After Reporting Family Killed in Mobile Home Out on Bond
A Georgia man arrested after he reported finding his family killed in their mobile home has been granted bond.
Guy Heinze Jr. was granted $20,000 bond Wednesday.
It was his first court appearance since he was arrested on charges of drug possession, evidence tampering and lying to police after the killings that claimed eight lives in this coastal Georgia city.
The judge ordered the 22-year-old Heinze placed under house arrest with an ankle monitor.
It was uncertain where Heinze would serve his house arrest since he was living in the mobile home where his relatives were found dead Saturday.
Police have released little information on who they think killed the family. They aren’t calling Heinze a suspect in the killings but also aren’t ruling him out.
newsdeskinternational
/ 09/04/2009Police Arrest Family Member in Brutal Georgia Mobile Home Murders
Police issued an arrest warrant on eight murder counts for Guy Heinze Jr. Friday, in connection with the murders and criminal attempt to commit murder in a Mobile Home Park in Glynn County, Georgia.
“The arrest comes after seven days of diligent investigation by Glynn County officers, with the assistance of other law enforcement agencies and volunteers.
Hours after the bodies were found, the 22-year-old was charged with evidence tampering and drug possession. But police didn’t say until Friday that they suspected him of the killings.
He had been briefly released on bond related to the lesser charges and arrested again later Friday.
Heinze’s father, Guy Heinz Sr., was among the eight dead.
The eight people killed in the brutal mobile home attack in the southeastern coastal city also included four older children and other members of an extended family.
The 12-minute emergency call by Heinze Jr. has provided some of the only details about the crime that Doering, the police chief, has called the worst murder case in his 25 years on the job.
On the call, Heinze Jr. screamed, “My whole family’s dead!” The 22-year-old seemed to struggle as he described what he saw, and at one point returned to the mobile home to find his cousin Michael, whom he says has Down syndrome, barely breathing.
“Michael’s alive, tell them to hurry!” Heinze Jr. is heard yelling in the background as a maintenance man at the mobile home park spoke with the dispatcher. “He’s beat up! His face is smashed in!”
The killings have the community on edge, and some have been critical of the lack of information being released by police. Others have been supportive.
Thomas Joiner, who has lived in the area since 1955, said he didn’t fault the chief for withholding information. But he said the uncertainty over whether a violent killer was on the loose is tough to take and he’s not taking chances.
I thought this guy might be involved. In the beginning the call, he said he just returned home and that his whole family was beaten to death….now how could he tell, if he wasn’t involved?
newsdeskinternational
/ 09/05/2009Teen says brother innocent in Ga. mobile home case
The brother of a Georgia man charged with slaying his father and seven others in a mobile home insisted Saturday that the suspect would never harm his family, and he also speculated that a dispute over drugs could have prompted the killings.
http://channels.isp.netscape.com/news/story.jsp?floc=FF-APO-1110&idq=/ff/story/0001%2F20090905%2F2122977033.htm&sc=1110&photoid=20090905GASM107
newsdeskinternational
/ 09/10/2009Heinze to public: Find ‘real killers’ in Brunswick slayings
The man charged with beating his father and seven others to death issued a plea to the public Wednesday for information to help police identify the real killer or killers. Guy Heinze Jr. reaffirmed that he was not involved in the massacre he reported Aug. 29 at the Brunswick home he shared with the victims.
Harrison (Heinze attorney) said the 22-year-old construction worker was devastated by the killings and further anguished by the charges accusing him of the slayings. It’s unknown if Heinze has given authorities DNA….Harrison dismissed public speculation that a $25,000 McIntosh Magistrate Court judgment awarded to Guy Heinze Sr. could be a motive for the younger Heinze to commit the slayings. The attorney said his client “didn’t know the outcome of the lawsuit.” The defendant in the case, the owner of a Darien mobile home park, has appealed the judgment to Superior Court.
Glynn County Police Chief Matt Doering has said all the evidence shows Heinze acted alone in bludgeoning his father and the others to death. Arrest warrants say he used a blunt instrument and intended to kill his victims.
The only survivor, Byron Jimerson Jr., 3, also was severely beaten and remained in critical condition Wednesday at a Savannah hospital.
Although autopsies have been completed, detectives are awaiting the results of toxicology tests. It’s possible, authorities said, that some of the victims might have been incapacitated by alcohol or drugs, or simply asleep when attacked.
Detectives completed their work Wednesday at the crime scene – a 980-square-foot home in New Hope Mobile Home Park. The three-bedroom, two-bathroom single-wide trailer has been released to the park owner, said Capt. Marissa Tindale, head of the detectives division of the police department.
Tindale said investigators continue interviewing possible witnesses, following up on tips, and searching for additional evidence in the case.
Police on all-terrain vehicles were seen Saturday searching along U.S. 17 North and the F.J. Torras Causeway between the mainland and St. Simons Island. Tindale declined to divulge what they were looking for or whether they found it.
Heinze is jailed without bail on eight counts of murder and single counts each of attempted murder, tampering with evidence, obstructing police, possession of the controlled substance Darvocet and misdemeanor possession of marijuana.
Heinze is charged with killing his 45-year-old father, Guy Heinze Sr.; Russell D. Toler Sr., 44; Toler’s children, Chrissy Toler, 22, Russell D. Toler Jr., 20, Michael Toler, 19, and Michelle Toler, 15; and Russell Toler Sr.’s sister, Brenda Gail Falagan, 49. They were buried Saturday in McIntosh County.
Heinze is also charged with killing Chrissy Toler’s boyfriend, Joseph L. West, 30, who will be buried Saturday in Brunswick.
District Attorney Stephen Kelley has said the case qualifies for the death penalty, but no decision will be made unless Heinze is indicted. A new Glynn County grand jury will be seated Monday.
If prosecutors seek the death penalty, it is likely that attorneys with the Georgia Capital Defenders Office, a state-funded agency, will take over Heinze’s defense.