Found Deceased CO - Gannon Stauch, 11, Colorado Springs, El Paso County, 27 Jan 2020 **ARREST** #43

[LietKynes]

The defense will spin this different ways, but will possibly try to use the 'snapped' excuse.
But she had 4 hours or more to think about what she was going to do.
Not that there's ever an excuse to murder a child.

 

[Warwick7]

In the AA, the LEO clearly says GS returned that day and that the murder took place afterward. I am curious why so many are so quick to disregard what the LEO believes happened. But also what is the narrative that fits with what we know in the AA because I tend to believe what is there?

Yes, but they also believed his body was carried away by animals.

The AA was written as "a no body affidavit"....

 

[dawnraks]

Very well stated, and I tend to agree. Also, I think it's telling that she did not unlock her phone for 30 minutes after they returned home from the 4hr trip. She was busy killing him at this time.

I'm sure she was both fuming and paniced that he did not pass away during the 4hr trip after she ODed him in the a.m., after her physical abuse the night before.

She had one hour before Laina would be home. One hour.

I do wonder why she brought him home at all.

The only thing I can think of is that she needed him laying down and calm, sleeping, resting, to finish him off. For as much as I believe she resented him, I don't think she wanted to kill him with him alert and facing her.

Did I miss something? Where did you find that she OD'd him or are you just speculating? On what?

 

[TallTxn]

Hello all. 1st post here. Been following this thread from the start and decided to join. Here for Gannon!

 

[MemPat]

Probably geared towards cheaters.

Isn't it pathetic that deceitful people are paying for enough fake polygraphs to support a business like that one?
It's enough to bring on a "what is this world coming to?!"

 

[Warwick7]

In the AA, the LEO clearly says GS returned that day and that the murder took place afterward. I am curious why so many are so quick to disregard what the LEO believes happened. But also what is the narrative that fits with what we know in the AA because I tend to believe what is there?

Yes, but they also believed his body was carried away by animals.

The AA was written as "a no body affidavit"....

I don't dispute the AW as written. I accept it as LE's best theory of events at the time it was written.

In it, they concede they don't have conclusive video showing him return. But they believe/d that the crime scene indicated a non-survivable injury, resulting in death. Therefore, they infer he had to be at home at the time of the injury....

I agree with that near 100%, only I shift the timeline. I think it was a violent assault, but from which he didn't die. Therefore, it remains POSSIBLE he defied the odds, enough so that he walked to the truck....

We may find that she did in fact medicate him, overmedicated, so that he would be half asleep when she did what she planned to do.

And I think she did THAT at a remote location.

I won't be surprised if the Prosecution revises their theory a time or two before trial.

There's no delicate way to say this but Patrick Frazee allegedly admitted that killing someone (with a baseball bat) was harder than he thought it would be. And he was hitting against a wood floor.

If we believe TS used blunt force, it would've been absorbed in some measure by the mattress, perhaps rendering it an ineffective method for murder.

But this gets me to all three. A severe cut Sunday night, blunt force Monday morning, after the creepy sleeping photo, and then finishing the horror she started, with a gun offsite.

I am not bound to this theory, it's just my best guess based on the current information as I see it.

We'll know a whole lot more when this goes to trial. Until then, we guess.

JMO

Excellent!!!!!

 

[wyome]

Did I miss something? Where did you find that she OD'd him or are you just speculating? On what?

Sorry, just speculating.

 

[wyome]

Hello all. 1st post here. Been following this thread from the start and decided to join. Here for Gannon!

Welcome! Glad you're here.

 

[MassGuy]

I’m sure this has been discussed many times, but did we ever find out what the flashing lights and yelling at the Stauch Residence was all about? I think it happened like the first week GS was missing and it was caught on camera by a News Team.

Yeah, it ended up being a nothingburger. Sheriff’s department personnel didn’t realize there was a team of investigators inside the garage, and scared them when they went to close the garage door.

 

[Cindizzi]

I think the AA is wrong. She wasn't a teacher's assistant, she
was a teacher. The letters the CO districts (D-20 & D-3) sent to parents after she was arrested said she was a teacher. If she could have been called a teacher's assistant, she would have been as that would have made the schools look a bit better.

Still, I doubt the 180K figure too unless all of the following were true:

1. It was household income and included any money HH earned.

2. It included the social security TS should have been receiving for HH.

3. It included a military housing allowance.

4. It included hazard duty pay for AS.

Even then, it sounds like it could be a stretch.
JMO

This is a letter that D20 sent to parents on March 5, after her arrest was announced on March 2. They refer to her as a “ teacher applicant “. I’m assuming because she was still in orientation and pending the full results of background check. Perhaps when LE contacted D20 to verify the “ cant come to work “ text, someone mistakenly put assistant instead of applicant. JMO

 

[TallTxn]

I’m sure if anyone else came to the house video would exist

Going on Google Earth you can zoom in on the neighbors houses directly across the street and both houses look to have porch cameras. I think there could possibly be more video of who was coming and going.

 

[RaspberryMama]

The affidavit isn't to convince you, me or a jury. It has one purpose: to convince a Judge. To issue an arrest warrant. Some states use Grand Juries (relatively rare, I think) but most states just require that the DA come before a judge and give probable cause for an arrest. Probable.

SBM

Yeah, I really do know that. I was being a little tongue-in-cheek there. Everything would be simpler if they had written it to convince me, though.

 

[O.Incandenza]

I don't think it's a question of many being quick to dismiss what's given in the AA. The AA contains two elements: one, the factual evidence they have collected and two, the assumptions/theories/conclusions they made, at that time, based on the evidence they had. No one that I have seen disputes the evidence. What is up for discussion and what many challenge are the assumptions they made at that time, based on that evidence. For example, at that time, they had no body, but based on the evidence they had, they concluded he had been murdered. That's valid: blood, proof a violence occurred, no one seeing him after that date, her changing stories, etc. They built a pretty good case. But they at no time in the AA make the statement that the volume of blood they found was inconsistent with life. Hence, it's possible that the violence that resulted in the blood wasn't the cause of his death. Fact: blood. Fact: no one has seen him since. Fact: last person to see him keeps changing stories. Fact: bedding changed from morning to evening. Conclusion: Murder in the bedroom. Conclusion: he must have returned home with her. But none of those facts alone proves a murder took place. That conclusion came as a result of all the facts added up together. And the conclusion he must have returned home was arrived at as a result of the first conclusion. Point: we can accept the facts and even accept some of the conclusions. But all of those theories are up for debate, just as they will be for a jury.

I think this a good way to look at it.

I still lean towards the AA's theory that Gannon was killed in the house and hidden in the SUV. The main reason I think that is the fact that TS was so determined to hide the SUV from LS and LE. The AA establishes that she left it at the airport, rented a car, and then lied about the SUV's location when questioned by LS and LE. They found this so suspicious that on the day after Gannon went missing, they spent time looking for the car instead of him. And then she went back that night to retrieve it, took it for a drive to dispose of something, and then hid it again somewhere overnight. And then she cleaned it. She went to a lot of effort to keep whatever was in that car away from LE and was willing to arouse suspicion to do so. That makes me think that whatever was in that car was incredibly incriminating.

Under the theory that Gannon was attacked in the house and then taken somewhere in the truck to be killed , the SUV isn't involved at all. I guess you could hypothesize that she used it to dispose of the bloody bedding or something. But why not do that on Monday when she killed Gannon? Or on Monday night? Or on Tuesday morning when she went to the airport?

 

[UnapologeticallyAspie]

I can no longer see the rest after David, can somebody please post the link for me again? Thank you so much!

I was using talk to text and tending to my husband.
I just now saw that TTT translated ‘arrest affidavit’ to “rest after David”. Lol whoops.

Thank you for understanding.

 

[esmerelda]

Is it only the ADT data that seems to show that he was killed between 2:20 and 3:00 pm? Isn't it possible that Laina was sent outside until 4?

I dunno, I agree that the timeline seems so strange.

I bet you're right about no video showing how she got him back into the house. I wonder if that particle board was originally in the back of the truck, to keep the truck bed protected from stuff.

I've come to the conclusion they are talking about masonite. It is a smooth fairly flexible pressed wood product. I work in construction and have used it many times over the years to "move" heavy things. It can be easily dragged as one side is smooth and shiny like ETA It is also used underneath threading machines for steel pipe to absorb cutting oil

 

[SleuthBee]

We don't know if cadaver dogs went through the home, but if they were brought in, they must not have alerted.
If they had, that would have been mentioned in the affidavit.

If cadaver dogs were brought in and didn't alert anywhere in/around either the basement or the garage, that's another point against the theory that he was killed in his bedroom and then stowed in her trunk until the next day.

JMO.

I asked @MassGuy this question, and now I am asking again:
Can the prosecution use a different theory than the one listed in the Affidavit during the Preliminary hearing or the trial?

For example: Evidence now supports that Gannon was seriously injured in his bedroom, but not killed.

** Disclaimer: Repeating my question is due to my need for reassurance and is in NO WAY a reflection of my respect for @MassGuy's knowledge.
- Also, this post is not intended to incite another wager opportunity

 

[Cindizzi]

I was using talk to text and tending to my husband.
I just now saw that TTT translated ‘arrest affidavit’ to “rest after David”. Lol whoops.

Thank you for understanding.

Lol I have become quite fluent in reading typos and talk-to text.

 

[ab01]

Isn't it pathetic that deceitful people are paying for enough fake polygraphs to support a business like that one?
It's enough to bring on a "what is this world coming to?!"

Jerry.....Jerry,.......Jerry!

 

[SleuthBee]

I've been in a house nearly identical to theirs so maybe I can give some insight.

JMO

Highly doubtful there's a wash tub anywhere in the house. The laundry room in likely a small square, half of which is eaten up by the washer and dryer.

Likely the utility room is fairly small too. The only storage in these 4-3 houses is generally under the staircase and in the utility room. Small or not, the utility room would make a GREAT place to find a suitcase and an even GREATER place to hide something temporarily, like bedsheets. Stashed in a leftover moving box.

I can imagine a scenario Sunday night that resulted in some serious blood and serious bandaging. Good to go. I can even see a braintrust thinking she could replace a square of carpet by removing it -- it would have been practically brand new and very likely the builder would've left a small roll of excess in the utility room, along with extra tile and housepaint.

Could be why the bed had been pulled out.

IF she did try to replace carpet, she would have quickly discovered that it's complicated! The rest of the room would lose its tension and rumple!

How ever this occurred, I'm fully confident they'll present a solid case. I'm imagining incriminating linens from the landfill, traffic cam footage by the mile, and Internet and cellular data to bury her alive.

Her defense attorneys will do what they've been trained to do. They'll represent her, they'll make sure her trial is fair. They'll expect to lose. They're not in the business like a few circus attorneys of spinning wild tales but in protecting their client from violations of the Constitution. She'll get a fair trial. The Prosecution will get a fair conviction. The world will remember Gannon, the happy young man who loved his parents, his sister and Sonic. And that wretched stepthing? We'll intentionally forget about her.

I look forward to that day

HMO

@Megnut I really like your thinking

 

[nrbc4]

Yeah, it ended up being a nothingburger. Sheriff’s department personnel didn’t realize there was a team of investigators inside the garage, and scared them when they went to close the garage door.

Thank you...I don’t know why I couldn’t remember and it’s bugged me for 2 days.