On this
date, October 15, 2008, United States Marine Corps Sergeant Jan Paweł Pietrzak
and his wife, Quiana Jenkins Pietrzak were murdered by four men in California. We,
Unit 1012: The VFFDP, offer our most sincere condolences to the family members
of the couple, this case was a reminisce of the murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom, where two of the four men were sentenced to death for
their crimes. Unit 1012 wish that there was a Joint Enterprise Law and all were
be put to death for sure.
Comrades
of Unit 1012 will post information of the case from Wikipedia. We, the Comrades
of Unit 1012 will honor Jan Pawel Pietrzak as a fallen soldier. May he and his
wife RIP!
Twenty-four-year-old
Janek Pietrzak and his 26-year-old wife, Quiana Faye Jenkins-Pietrzak, were
murdered in their French Valley home. Credit: Maggie Avants (PHOTO SOURCE: http://murrieta.patch.com/groups/police-and-fire/p/former-marine-sentenced-to-life-for-murder-of-french-valley-couple)
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The Murder of Jan Paweł Pietrzak
and Quiana Jenkins Pietrzak relates to the events surrounding the 2008
deaths of United States Marine Corps
Sergeant Jan Paweł Pietrzak (March 13, 1984 – October 15, 2008) and
his wife Quiana Jenkins-Pietrzak (February 16, 1982 - October 15, 2008).
Sgt. Jan Pietrzak and
his wife, Quiana Faye Jenkins-Pietrzak, were slain in their home by a group of
Camp Pendleton Marines in 2008. One of those former Marines was sentenced to
the death penalty Friday, July 19. (PHOTO
SOURCE: http://www.pe.com/local-news/riverside-county/murrieta/murrieta-headlines-index/20130719-french-valley-death-sentence-for-former-marine-who-murdered-couple.ece)
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Overview
Pietrzak was a Polish American who
joined the U.S. Marine Corps in 2003. After a tour in Iraq as a helicopter
mechanic, Pietrzak returned to the United States, where he met and married
Jenkins, an African-American. Together, they owned and lived in a house in Winchester,
a census-designated place in Riverside County, California, located near the Marine
Corps Air Station Miramar, where Pietrzak worked.
On October 15, 2008, four black
Marines entered the Pietrzak home, sexually assaulted Jenkins-Pietrzak and
tortured the couple before killing them. Two of the four accused Marines worked
under Pietrzak's command. Despite efforts to convey the event as being racially
motivated, Riverside County authorities maintain the motivation was robbery,
and the pending murder with special circumstances and sexual assault charges do
not include an assertion that the crime was racially motivated. All four of the
accused plead not guilty to murdering Pietrzak and his wife.
After meeting with the families of the
deceased, District Attorney Rod Pacheco decided to seek the death penalty on
January 22, 2009. The preliminary trial hearings to determine whether the four
assailants would stand trial occurred on March 26, 2009, and April 3, 2009 in
San Diego.
On 24 June 2013 a jury recommended the
death penalty for two of the four assailants and life in prison without parole
for a third.
Jan Paweł Pietrzak and Quiana Jenkins Pietrzak
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Background
Jan Paweł Pietrzak, named after Pope John
Paul II, was born in either Kłodzko or Świdnica, Poland. In 1994, when Pietrzak
was age ten, his family emigrated to the U.S., and settled in the Bensonhurst
neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York.
Pietrzak joined the Marines in 2003,
became a helicopter mechanic and was sent to Iraq. After his return, he married
Jenkins, whom he had met in 2005 at a party for Marines being deployed to Iraq.
Jenkins, who worked for the local Black Infant Care Center, was initially
reluctant to date a Marine. But Pietrzak won her over, and they were married on
August 8, 2008. They bought a house in May in Winchester, an exurb of San
Diego, near Camp Pendleton, and Pietrzak remained in the Marines, working as a
helicopter airframe mechanic at the Marine Corps Air Station Miramar.
Death
On October 15, 2008, a group of four
Marines entered the Pietrzak home. It was not initially known how they managed
to get in as Jenkins-Pietrzak was very careful about security and had equipped
the house with an alarm. Later, it was alleged that Tyrone Miller forced entry
into the residence by pointing a shotgun at Pietrzak.
After a short skirmish, the couple
were bound with duct tape and gagged. Jenkins-Pietrzak was then sexually
assaulted as her husband was forced to watch. Finally, both were shot in the
head, execution-style. Several small fires were set in the home in an apparent
attempt to destroy evidence of the crime. Lance Cpl. Emrys John, age 18, of
Maryland, Lance Cpl. Kesuan Sykes, age 21, of California, Pvt. Kevin Darnell
Cox, 20, of Tennessee, and Lance Cpl. Tyrone Miller, age 20, of North Carolina
were charged with the murders. Two of the four Marines charged in the
execution-style murders worked for Pietrzak. Three of the suspects claim that
the shooter was 18-year-old John. Miller and Cox have reportedly confessed to
the murders, although all four suspects have accused the others of raping
Jenkins-Pietrzak. Shortly before the murder, John posted "Chillin waitin 4
da killin" on his MySpace page.
SARAH BURGE/STAFF PHOTO
Glenda Faye Jenkins, the mother of Quiana
Jenkins-Pietrzak, speaks at the sentencing of Tyrone Miller on Friday, July 19,
in Riverside Superior Court. Miller was sentenced to the death penalty in the
slayings of Jenkins-Pietrzak and her husband. (PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.pe.com/local-news/riverside-county/murrieta/murrieta-headlines-index/20130719-french-valley-death-sentence-for-former-marine-who-murdered-couple.ece)
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Motives
Three days after the murder, the Los
Angeles Times ran an October 18, 2008, news brief noting that the bodies
were identified on October 17. On Monday, November 3, the Sheriff's Department
announced that it had four Marines under arrest for the murders. As part of the
November 3 announcement, the Sheriff's Department noted that investigators had
found numerous items of evidence since October 15 linking the four to the
killings, even though the killers set a fire in the house to destroy evidence.
On November 6, CNN television news journalist Jane Velez-Mitchell reported that
the four Marines under arrest were African American and raised the possibility
of race as a motivation.
In early November, the four Marines
were charged with two counts of murder with special circumstances — murder
during commission of a felony, murder during commission of a robbery and
committing more than one offense. They additionally face one charge each of
sexual penetration with a foreign object, and the District Attorney's office
will decide if to pursue death sentences. Just after the release of the
charges, the New York Post ran a story entitled "A Few 'Bad' Men -
Race Eyed in Marine Dual Slay" which noted that the four accused Marines
"could face the death penalty amid speculation the mixed-race couple was
targeted in a bias attack." At about the same time, District Attorney Rod Pacheco
emphasized the robbery motive, commenting, "To burglarize their home and
then to treat them in the way they did before they died and to murder them —
it's hard for our minds to comprehend this kind of savagery."
By mid-November, the Riverside County
Sheriff's Central Homicide unit responded to the race motivation issue, stating
"There's nothing to suggest what happened was a racial crime." Detectives
said jewelry, a camera, and wedding gifts had been stolen, and that some of the
items were found in the suspects' barracks.
Despite the conclusion proposed by the
investigators, the couple's parents and many in the general populace, as shown
by blogs and posts over the Internet, continue to believe that there was a
possible racial motive, particularly since Jenkins-Pietrzak was sexually
assaulted, and there was evidence of premeditation in the murders (as 'Chillin
waitin 4 da killin' was posted on a perpetrator's MySpace page before the
murders) Anti-miscegenation racial epithets in the form of "Nigger Lover"
were found on the wall near the master bedroom and on a bathroom mirror. The
Defendants have all indicated that spray-painting the racial epithets was a
calculated attempt to misdirect investigators.
On November 20, all four pleaded not
guilty to murdering the Pietrzaks. District Attorney Rod Pacheco on February 2,
2009, decided to pursue the death penalty against the suspects.
Correspondence
and other involvement with White House
On November 11, 2008 (Veteran's Day),
Pietrzak's mother, Henryka Pietrzak-Varga, wrote a letter to president-elect Barack
Obama about what happened to her son and daughter-in-law, wondering, "If
it was a robbery, why didn't they come when nobody was home instead of in the
dead of night, armed to the teeth? ... What was it about my son and
daughter-in-law that inspired such hatred and loathing?" Pietrzak-Varga
has said she believes the crime was racially motivated, as her son was not
well-off. Seven months later on July 27, 2009, the Obama administration
responded with generic form letter made for all soldiers killed in combat. Once
it made it to the news, the Obama administration issued an apology. The mothers
of Pietrzak and Jenkins requested an audience with President Obama. In a letter
to the president, the mother of slain Sgt. Jan Paweł Pietrzak said they want to
"talk how the sacrifice of Jan Paweł and Quiana could unite us." On
August 17, 2009, the Commissioner on Civil Rights in Poland wrote to the U.S.
Ambassador to Poland supporting this request. The U.S. ambassador responded
with a short letter on August 24.
SARAH BURGE/STAFF
PHOTO
Henryka Varga, the mother of slain Marine Sgt.
Jan Pietrzak, speaks at the sentencing of Tyrone Miller Friday, July 19, in
Riverside Superior Court. Miller, a former Marine, was sentenced to death. (PHOTO SOURCE: http://www.pe.com/local-news/riverside-county/murrieta/murrieta-headlines-index/20130719-french-valley-death-sentence-for-former-marine-who-murdered-couple.ece)
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Criminal
trials
On April 3, at a preliminary hearing
for the four defendants, prosecutors alleged that the motivation for the crime
was financial, not racial. Evidence, however, presented at the hearing detailed
that two racist remarks were spray painted in the couple's home. Evidence was
also presented showing that Jenkins-Pietrzak was sexually assaulted and that
Jan was severely beaten. Riverside County investigator Benjamin Ramirez
testified that property belonging to the couple was recovered from Miller's
residence on Camp Pendleton, including bank cards, a bracelet with the couple's
names written in Polish, and Pietrzak's dress blue uniform. Investigators
further testified that footprints left at the crime scene were linked to shoes
belonging to the suspects.
On May 8, 2009, a recording was played
in court of Cox's girlfriend, Melissa Buck, stating that after Cox and the
other three accused returned home after the alleged murder, they drank beer and
that one of them said, "Good job, E. You earned your stripes
tonight." Buck stated that the four had carried out other burglaries prior
to the killings and that she had gone with them on one occasion.
In June, Miller acquaintance Justin P.
Weissinger testified that several days after the crime Miller had confided in
him details of the assault and killing of the Pietrzaks. Weissinger had
accompanied Miller and the other suspects on previous burglaries and home
invasions.
On August 12, 2009, Riverside County
Superior Court Judge Judith Clark ordered the four defendants to be tried for
the deaths of the Pietrzaks. The re-arraignment was scheduled for August 26.
The trial of the four was suspended on
February 1, 2011 after Kesaun Sykes urinated during a court hearing. The judge
ordered a psychological evaluation for Sykes. Sykes' mental competency trial
began on May 24, 2011. The jury returned a verdict of mentally fit after two
hours of deliberations. In response, the judge ordered criminal proceedings to
resume against Sykes and his co-defendants.
Three of the defendants, Kevin Darnell
Cox, 25, Emrys Justin John, 23, and Tyrone Miller, 25, went on trial for murder
and related charges on Monday, April 8, 2013, at 9 a.m. at the Riverside Hall
of Justice. Two separate juries, one for Cox and another for John and Miller,
were empaneled to hear the case. The fourth defendant, 25-year-old Kesaun
Kedron Sykes, was tried separately because there was not enough space in the
Hall of Justice for three juries.
On June 5, 2013 Cox and John were
convicted of two counts of first-degree murder. Miller was convicted of sexual
penetration with a foreign object and two counts of first-degree murder.
On June 20, 2013, a jury recommended
that Judge Thierbach sentence Tyrone Miller and Emrys John to death, and a
separate jury recommended that Cox be sentenced to life without possibility of
parole. The fourth defendant, Kesaun Sykes, will go on trial in August 2013.
On July 19, 2013, in Riverside
Superior Court, Miller was sentenced to execution. On August 16, 2013 Cox and
John were sentenced. Cox was sentenced to two life terms without parole Cox
showed no remorse stating, "I apologize for what happened to the victims'
family. I didn't say I'm sorry I did anything because I still don't feel that I
did anything to be here for it." He also said he would appeal. John, the
gunman, was given the death penalty. Judge Christian Theirbach called the
murders savage, and the most inhuman he had seen in his 27 years on the bench.
This story was so sad. I’m glad justice was served. This horrific story touched me to my core. Rest In Peace Jan and Quiana, you guys are missed very much
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