No excuse for murdering foster child

'It was murder,' Deters says
Cincinnati Post, The (OH)
August 30, 2006

Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters says he is confident foster parents Liz and David Carroll will be convicted of murdering a 3-year-old developmentally disabled boy who was in their care.
Deters said the boy, Marcus Fiesel, was restrained with packing tape, rolled up in a blanket and left for two days in a closet while the Carrolls attended a family reunion.

"I don't know how you could leave a child in that condition for that long and believe he was going to be alive," the prosecutor said.

"I'm saying it was murder. I'm confident of a successful murder prosecution. Our goal, quite frankly, is to have these two individuals locked up as long as possible."

When the Carrolls were arrested Monday, the most serious charge against them was involuntary manslaughter. Deters said he understood that was of concern to the public.

"The reason for that charge was simply to hold them and to seize (their other) children from them," he said.

"They will not be facing involuntary manslaughter charges. They're going to be facing murder charges. They are inevitable. It's going to happen."

The Carrolls are accused of putting Marcus into a closet of their rented house in Clermont County's Union Township when they left Aug. 4 to attend a family reunion in Kentucky.

"Marcus was wrapped in a blanket in wrapping tape -- clear packing tape -- with his arms behind him," said Deters. "It wasn't the first time he had been wrapped. We think it was the first time he was put in a closet. He was wrapped like a cocoon."

Deters said Amy Baker, a woman who lived with the Carrolls, was cooperating with authorities in the case.

"The ultimate decision on whether or not she (Baker) faces charges depends on whether or not she ever hurt Marcus," the prosecutor said. "We'll just see where the evidence leads us. If she continues to cooperate and did not hurt the child, she will not be charged."

On Aug. 15, nine days after authorities believe the Carrolls returned home from the family reunion to find Marcus dead in the closet, Liz Carroll told police that she had taken him to Juilfs Park in Anderson Township, had passed out from a health problem and awakened to find Marcus missing.

Police, along with hundreds of civilian volunteers, searched the park and adjacent areas for several days in vain. A week after the alleged disappearance, Liz Carroll called a news conference and urged people to continue to look for the boy.

The public pleas for help came after Marcus' body had been taken to Brown County and burned, said Deters. Police have recovered what Deters described as "material" from Brown County and taken it to the Hamilton County coroner's office for DNA testing to determine if it's from Marcus' body.

The Boone County Water Rescue Squad was searching the Ohio River at Aberdeen Tuesday night with a special type of sonar as part of the effort to recover Marcus' remains.

"They (the Carrolls) were committed to covering this crime up," the prosecutor said. "They went back repeatedly to burn the body. They went back two or three times."

The prosecutor said the story that Marcus went missing from Juilfs Park was one of two plans hatched by the Carrolls to explain the boy's absence.

"The other plan was to take the kids to Kings Island and all of a sudden Marcus was gone," said Deters. "This was well thought-out. They had a lot of time to do this."

A Hamilton County grand jury on Monday indicted the Carrolls on charges of involuntary manslaughter and child endangerment, and David Carroll was charged with gross abuse of a corpse.

On Tuesday, a grand jury indicted the couple on charges of making false alarms and inducing panic for alleging Marcus had gone missing and causing the park to be evacuated.

Liz Carroll was also indicted for perjury in connection with her testimony Monday before a grand jury.

Deters, asked what Liz Carroll lied about, said, "Everything. We could have had 100 counts of perjury. And I think perjury is probably going to be the least of her worries when this is all over."

The Carrolls were scheduled to be arraigned today and Deters said he expected the couple to plead not guilty.

The prosecutor said ever since Marcus' purported disappearance two weeks ago, the Carrolls and Baker "have constantly been deceptive and lied" until Baker recently began cooperating with authorities.

"This is one of those cases where we literally had to rely on somebody," said Deters. Asked why Baker finally began cooperating, the prosecutor said, "There are systems in our legal process that if you lie, you are going to prison."

Because both Clermont and Hamilton counties are involved in the case, Deters said he plans to meet later this week with Clermont County Prosecutor Don White to decide where the Carrolls will be tried and what the charges ultimately will be.

"It is the opinion of this office and the Clermont County prosecutor's office that at the very least these two individuals should be charged with murder," said Deters.

The prosecutor said he believes the Carrolls, who made their living from foster care and day care, were ill-equipped to provide a home for a developmentally disabled child like Marcus.

"I think that Marcus had special needs that these people had no training in, that they accumulated as many foster kids and day care kids as possible to maximize how much money they made," said Deters.

Three months ago, Butler County Children Services contracted with Lifeway for Youth, a Sharonville nonprofit social service agency, to place Marcus with the Carrolls.

"It's a serious understatement that they dropped the ball," Deters said of the foster care agency. "You have a kid like this, you need to make unannounced visits to the house, insist on seeing him, see how many kids are in the house, how you're able to control that situation, and they didn't.

"If any good comes from this horrible tragedy, I hope there is a serious review of the foster care program in this country."

As for what the Carrolls are alleged to have done to Marcus, Deters said it may simply come down to one word -- evil.

"Every normal person wants to find an excuse for this," he said. "Sometimes people are just evil. I've got to tell you, that's just a fact. You don't want to think that way, but it is a fact.

"You want to think they've got mental problems, they're on drugs, there's some reason for this behavior. But they're just bad people."