She loved being a mother’: Pregnant woman executed for refusing abortion, family says

Candace Pickens had fallen in love with being a mother to her little boy, Zachaeus.
Her Facebook page is full of photos documenting the bond between mother and child as it strengthened over birthdays, holidays and visits with their extended, close-knit family.
“When she found out she was pregnant, she was scared at first,” the 23-year-old’s aunt, Irene Jenny Pickens, told The Washington Post. “But once she had that baby, it was so natural for her.
“She loved being a mother. And no matter what she was going through, I think he was the one thing that kept her going.”
© Courtesy of Torre White One of the things Candace Pickens was going through in recent months, relatives said, was a volatile and abusive relationship — one she managed to keep hidden from some of the people who knew her best in and around Asheville, N.C., where she lived.
Her boyfriend, Nathaniel Elijah Dixon, had a violent history that included attempted robbery and allegations of domestic violence against another woman with whom he had a child, according to the Citizen-Times. In addition to Dixon’s extensive criminal history, police think he has possible ties to a Los Angeles street gang.
© Asheville Police Department Nathaniel Elijah Dixon. When Pickens recently discovered that she was pregnant with Dixon’s child, abortion was not an option, she told friends and family members.
She would have a second child, she insisted.
Now, relatives think it was that insistence that may have led to her death.
Her body was found early on the morning of May 12 by a jogger in a park in Asheville. She had been shot in the head at point-blank range, police said — executed.
Beside her, investigators said, was Zachaeus, badly injured but clinging to life.
Just one day after his birthday, the 3-year-old had witnessed his mother being shot in the face before he endured the same fate and was left for dead.
Pickens was declared dead at the scene. Her son was taken to a hospital, where he underwent emergency surgery; he is in stable but critical condition, police said.
Mekia Waters, the child’s grandmother, told The Post that Zachaeus was shot in the head and lost his left eye; but she forcefully denied local reports that his chance of survival is just 50 percent.
“My grandson is in stable condition and doing great and he has the doctors surprised,” Waters said Wednesday. “He’s moving his arms and legs and he’s doing more than what people expected.”
“He’s talking, he asked for juice and he said ‘daddy,'” she added. “He even made his own song up about juice.”
Waters also said her family members have not set up a GoFundMe page and have not been contacted by the creators of several existing pages that claim to be raising money for her grandson.
“My grandson is not a charity fund,” she said. “We’re not asking for a dime — only prayer.”
Dixon, who also lives in Asheville, fled to Columbus, Ohio, where he was arrested last week, authorities said. WLOS reported that Columbus police rescued a 21-year-old female hostage when Dixon was taken into custody.
The 24-year-old is awaiting extradition back to North Carolina, where he has been charged with first-degree murder, attempted first-degree murder and child abuse resulting in serious bodily injury, authorities said.
To Pickens’s friends and relatives, the motive was clear.
“He found out she was pregnant and he wanted her to abort the baby,” Irene Jenny Pickens told The Post. “She would never do that. It wasn’t an option for her, and that’s what sparked the violence.”
She added: “You could tell things were going on between them based on what she was posting on Facebook — but I don’t think anyone expected anything like this.”
Christina Hallingse, a spokeswoman for the Asheville Police Department, told The Post that authorities can’t confirm whether Pickens’s apparent refusal to undergo an abortion was a motive in her killing, citing the ongoing investigation.
“The Asheville Police Department does not provide comment on an offender’s motive because that information is sensitive to the case itself,” Hallingse said. “Our responsibility at this point in the investigation is to present the best case possible to the District Attorney’s Office for prosecution of the suspected offender.”
But the theory that Dixon decided to kill his girlfriend because she wouldn’t have an abortion was echoed on a GoFundMe page set up by one of her close friends.
“Candace was an amazing mother, friend and person,” Vanessa Peterson wrote. “She was always smiling and made the best out of life. She had recently found out she was pregnant and was murdered because she refused an abortion.
“So many loved ones have lost such an amazing person and more importantly an innocent child has not only witnessed his mother’s murder the day after his third birthday.”
A medical examiner confirmed that Pickens was pregnant at the time of her death, police said. The examiner told WLOS that he didn’t know how far along she was in her pregnancy.
Given the medical examiner’s finding, police also charged Dixon with first-degree murder of an unborn child.
Victoria Jayne, an assistant capital defender in Buncombe County, N.C., told The Post that Dixon has not yet been assigned an attorney.
On Facebook, hours before his capture in Columbus, Dixon shared three posts — including two private videos — about Pickens.
Using hashtags including #Ripbabymamaloveu and #candaceuwillbemissed, Dixon’s Facebook page portrays a grieving man shocked by his girlfriend’s sudden death.
“Candace pickens was pregnant with my child…this morning i lost my child too,” he wrote.
Many of his Facebook friends voiced support — although some pointed out that Dixon has been accused of killing the woman and unborn child he claimed to love, and nearly killing her firstborn son, as well.
The horrific double shooting shocked local residents.
“Not only take this young mother’s life, cut down in her prime, cannot raise her son now, but then you turn around and shoot the child in the head,” Keith Ogden, senior pastor of Hill Street Baptist Church, told WLOS. “That’s evil.”
Ogden held a memorial for Pickens at his church Saturday. Hours later, mourners gathered for a vigil at the park where police say Pickens was executed.
“It is time for us to come together to grieve the loss of a special, young mother,” vigil organizers said in a statement. “To support the mothers of our community, especially the single mothers. To stand together in defiance of violence.”
During the ceremony, WLOS reported, Pickens’s father addressed the crowd, “saying he doesn’t have bitterness in his heart, but forgiveness.”

Police search for suspects after 5 women escape from basement

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah police are searching for two suspects after a woman and her four teenage daughters were lured to a house and tied up in a basement before they managed to escape, authorities said Wednesday.
A father and son armed with a shotgun and a baseball bat brought the five to a room where they tied them up with duct tape and zip ties Tuesday night, said Centerville police Lt. Von Steenblik.
Flint Wayne Harrison, 51, and Dereck James Harrison, 22, had invited the women to the house for a barbecue as part of a plan to retaliate against the mother, investigators said. She has a connection the younger suspect that's believed to involve drugs, police said.
© Provided by Associated Press Utah police are searching for two suspects, Flint Wayne Harrison and Dereck James Harrison, after a woman and her four teenage daughters were lured to a house and tied in a… When they arrived, the men invited them downstairs, where strips of duct tape and zip ties were lined up on the ground, according to charging documents.
The men ordered the women to get on the ground, took their phones and bound their hands and feet, the documents said. They put a bag over the mother's head.
The girls managed to escape their bonds while the men beat the mother with a baseball bat. Some of the teens were also struck by the bat after they broke free. All five women ran screaming from the house and called police.
"It could have gone really bad," Steenblik said. "Without the girls breaking free and getting loose, I'm not sure what they were going to do."
Investigators found methamphetamine in the house and relatives told police the men had been using drugs heavily over the last few days, police said.
Police say the kidnapping attempt was reported about 6 p.m. Tuesday and they began working the case then, but didn't issue a news release until Wednesday morning because they don't believe the men are a danger to the general public.
Flint Harrison's wife told police that he doesn't want to go to prison, intends to shoot officers and "go out in a blaze of glory," according to charging documents.
The mother and one daughter were treated at a hospital for their injuries.
The daughters range from 13 to 18 years old, and appear to be recovering well, Steenblik said.
"All four of those girls were pretty resilient and very helpful to us," he said. During the struggle, one girl managed to get a hold of the bat and hit one of the attackers, and another slapped the shotgun away when it was pointed at her throat, court documents state.
The men drove away in a Chevrolet Suburban with Wyoming plates. Police say Flint Harrison lives there and the men have other ties to the state. He's on the Wyoming sex offender registry because of an attempted forcible sexual abuse conviction from Utah in 2001, records show.
Flint Harrison and DJ Harrison were charged Wednesday with 16 counts, including aggravated kidnapping and possession of a controlled substance.
The Associated Press sought comment from the suspects, but phone numbers listed for the father were disconnected and no number was listed for the son.

Texas fertilizer plant blast that killed 15 was criminal act - ATF

May 11 (Reuters) - A blast that killed 15 people three years ago triggered by a fire at a Texas fertilizer plant was a criminal act, U.S. agents said on Wednesday after conducting extensive tests that eliminated accidental and natural causes.
"The only hypothesis that could not be eliminated ... and was confirmed by extensive testing ... is incendiary," Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives investigator Rob Elder, special agent in charge for the Houston field office. He spoke at a news conference on the blast that ripped through the city of West, about 75 miles (120 km) south of Dallas, in 2013.
Twelve of the 15 people who died were firefighters. Scores of others were injured and more than 500 homes were damaged in the blast, which was so powerful it registered as a magnitude 2.1 earthquake. Damage estimates have been pegged at $100 million.
Elder said a reward of up to $50,000 was being offered for information leading to the person or persons responsible for starting the blaze, adding that no arrests have been made.
"We have never stopped investigating this fire," he said. "It is our highest priority to see that the victims of this tragedy are provided an accurate explanation of what happened that day."

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If a suspect is found, that person could face state capital murder charges in Texas, which can bring the death penalty. The investigation is a joint state and federal effort.
The Texas attorney general's office said it can assist in finding and prosecuting suspects.
"Our office stands ready and willing to assist local prosecutors in pursuing the potential criminal acts behind this catastrophe that claimed the lives of 15 Texans," David Maxwell, the office's director of law enforcement, said in a statement.
The explosion damaged an area measuring roughly the size of 37 city blocks, Elder said, and left a crater 93 feet (28 metres) wide by 12 feet (3.7 metres) deep.
More than 400 interviews have been conducted and more than $2 million spent on the ongoing probe, Elder said. The costs included rebuilding to exact specifications parts of the plant to determine what happened.
The fire was reported on the evening of April 17, 2013, and a large explosion ripped through the plant some 22 minutes later, Elder said.
The source of the explosion was ammonium nitrate stored in a wooden container at the plant, investigators have said.
The ammonium nitrate detonated with the force of approximately 15,000 pounds to 20,000 pounds (6,800 kg to 9,100 kg) of TNT, according to federal officials.
The 12 firefighters who died were unprepared for the ferocity of the fire, which was "significantly beyond the extinguishment stage" and should have focused on evacuating the area rather than putting out the blaze, a 2014 report from the Texas State Fire Marshal's Office said.
The blast obliterated an entire neighborhood - including the high school and a nursing home - on the north side of the town, where the plant had been operating for more than 50 years.
The U.S. Chemical Safety Board said in a report this year the explosion likely happened because the owner of the facility kept combustible material near a 30-ton pile of ammonium nitrate, a fertilizer also used to make explosives.
The federal investigators also faulted community planning that allowed the town to grow up around the facility, exacerbating the damage.
A Reuters investigation conducted after the explosion found that hundreds of schools, 20 hospitals and 13 churches, as well as hundreds of thousands of households, were located near ammonium nitrate storage sites across the United States.
At least seven lawsuits had been filed against Adair Grain Inc, which owned the facility. Plaintiffs claimed negligence by the plant employees and sought millions of dollars in claims.
A partial settlement that included the families of the three killed in the explosion who were not firefighters was reached in October but the details were not released. (Writing by Jon Herskovitz; Additional reporting by Jim Forsyth in San Antonio; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and James Dalgleish)

Jury: School failed to protect girl who says she was raped

HONOLULU — Hawaii's public school system failed to protect a special education student who says she was raped by a classmate, a jury determined Monday.
But the verdict also says the state Department of Education and a special education teacher at Waianae High School didn't act recklessly or intentionally.
A jury of five men and three women deliberated over two days in a trial for a lawsuit filed by Mariana Harris' mother saying the then-freshman girl— with the intellectual ability of a second-grader— was raped by a then-senior boy from her special education class— with a low IQ — in a unisex bathroom in 2013.
The Associated Press doesn't usually identify sex assault victims unless they choose to go public. Harris, now 19, and her mother, Angelica Kauhako, told the AP after the verdict was announced that they hope by coming forward, they can help others.
"I'm happy it's over," Harris said. "I just pray that people understand it's not OK for people to get hurt that way."
Her attorneys were mostly pleased with the verdict. "It sends a clear, resounding message to the DOE that they have to pay closer attention to the special needs children and take care of them," said one of the plaintiff attorneys, Peter Hsieh.
Deputy state Attorney General Marie Gavigan, defending the department and the teacher, said she's disappointed by the verdict.
The jury awarded about $810,000 in damages to Harris and Kauhako. Their lawyers had asked for $3.2 million.
Jurors placed 95 percent of the fault to the department and 5 percent to the teacher, Kristin Lindquist. She attended the two-weeklong trial but was back at school Monday, Gavigan said. Plaintiffs didn't prove that Lindquist was "motivated by malice" according to the verdict.
Lindquist testified that when the boy returned from the bathroom, he looked "sick," so she asked him what happened. He told her he touched Harris and asked if he would be suspended, she said. She testified that she asked him if he touched her in her private areas and he said yes. It was a mistake to ask such "pointed" questions, Lindquist said, adding that she made the same mistake while questioning the girl about what happened. The girl told the teacher she was raped in the bathroom.
The teacher took immediate action and reported the incident to the dean of students, who called the police and had the boy removed from school, Gavigan told the jury.
A doctor who examined Harris the next day testified that she had tears consistent with a sexual assault. The defense argued those tears could have been caused by something else, such as her scratching herself.
Surveillance footage taken near the bathroom doesn't show that the students were inside at the same time, Gavigan said.
The jury determined plaintiffs proved that Harris was subjected to sexual harassment that was so "severe, pervasive and objectively offensive," that she was deprived of educational opportunities under a federal education law that protects against gender discrimination.
The judge could award additional damages under that law, Hsieh said.
After Kauhako filed the lawsuit, the education department sued the boy, now 21, saying that if the state is found liable, he should be responsible. The jury determined that he's not responsible to the defendants.
He was never arrested or charged in the incident.

Ex-49er Dana Stubblefield charged with raping disabled woman

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) -- Former San Francisco 49er Dana Stubblefield was charged Monday with the rape of a "developmentally delayed" woman, prosecutors announced.
The Santa Clara County District Attorney's Office said Stubblefield, a former defensive lineman for the San Francisco 49ers and Oakland Raiders, allegedly assaulted the woman on April 9, 2015, at his Morgan Hill home after interviewing her for a baby-sitting job. He is charged with five felony counts and faces a "substantial prison sentence" if convicted.
A day before the assault, Stubblefield contacted the then 31-year-old woman on a baby-sitting website and arranged an interview, prosecutors said.
"This was a crime of violence against a vulnerable victim," Deputy District Attorney Tim McInerny said. "She was looking for a job, and she was unconscionably assaulted."
Bail for Stubblefield, 45, is set at $250,000.
His arraignment is scheduled to take place within 24 hours.
According to a report by the Morgan Hill Police Department, the interview of the woman by Stubblefield lasted about 20 minutes. She later received a text from Stubblefield saying he wanted to pay her for her time that day, and she went back to the house, the San Jose Mercury News reported.
After raping her, Stubblefield gave her $80 and let her go. The woman immediately went to the Morgan Hill Police Department and reported the rape. DNA evidence matched that of Stubblefield, the report said.
Stubblefield's attorney, Gary Winuk, said the sex was consensual and that his client is being unfairly targeted because of his wealth and celebrity.
Stubblefield provided prosecutors with lie-detector results and with evidence that shows the sexual encounter last year was consensual, including proof that the woman asked his client for a job and money afterward, said attorney Ken Rosenfeld, who is also representing Stubblefield.
"Dana Stubblefield is being unfairly targeted due to his celebrity and wealth by someone with full motivation to lie," Rosenfeld said. "Mr. Stubblefield passed a lie-detector test with flying colors and will present a full, vigorous defense against these false allegations."