Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / Crime Alert 12.25.24 | Parents Keep Children in Cages 'For Their Own Safety'

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Crime Alert 12.25.24 | Parents Keep Children in Cages 'For Their Own Safety' · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

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  Speaker 1: Crime alert, imancy, grace breaking crimes. Now, Minnesota cops get
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  Speaker 1: several concerning calls about the Cotton families four young children.
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  Speaker 1: During a welfare check, they find a two year old
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  Speaker 1: with a diaper duck tape to her skin, trapped in
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  Speaker 1: a playpen by a dog cage in a bedroom. Two
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  Speaker 1: more children, ages five and seven, locked in a cage
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  Speaker 1: surrounding a bunk bed. Parents Christina and Benjamin Cotton, say
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  Speaker 1: they keep the children locked up at night for their
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  Speaker 1: own safety. The parents quote overslept, that's why the children
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  Speaker 1: had not been released from their cages yet. Officers say
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  Speaker 1: the children had been in cages for more than thirteen hours.
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  Speaker 2: Nancy. One other child, a nine year old, is found
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  Speaker 2: unrestrained in the basement. All five children showed signs of
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  Speaker 2: physical abuse, and the five and seven year old described
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  Speaker 2: being hit really hard, hit with a belt, and having
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  Speaker 2: their hands duct taped behind their backs if chores were
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  Speaker 2: not completed. The nine year old refused to discuss the abuse,
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  Speaker 2: saying their parents quote didn't want them talking about trouble
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  Speaker 2: and to quote keep it in the family. The Cottons
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  Speaker 2: were originally charged with sixteen counts each, but fifteen of
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  Speaker 2: those charges are dismissed.
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  Speaker 1: Benjamin Cotton forty two Christina Cotton forty take a plea
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  Speaker 1: deal and get four year sentences for one count each
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  Speaker 1: of child torture. Wow, I wonder how they're gonna like
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  Speaker 1: it in a cage. When Massachusetts cops pull up in
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  Speaker 1: the middle of a drug deal, the dealer takes off running.
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  Speaker 1: The man climbs the side of a home, runs across
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  Speaker 1: roofs before he disappears. A home owner alert's cops. It
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  Speaker 1: sounds like someone screaming in his chimney. The drug dealer
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  Speaker 1: thought he could shime down the chimney and escape through
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  Speaker 1: the home, but guess what, He's not Santa. He gets
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  Speaker 1: stuck halfway down and begs cops come get him. An
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  Speaker 1: officer laughs and calls a suspect an idiot, before grabbing
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  Speaker 1: firefighters to knock out enough bricks to pull the man free.
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  Speaker 1: He's now behind bars on drug charges and many outstanding wawants.
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  Speaker 1: Oh oh more crime and justice needs after this Now
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  Speaker 1: with the latest crime inestice breaking news crime Onlized John Lenley.
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  Speaker 3: A chilling case in Manhattan as a man faces dual
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  Speaker 3: charges in the fatal shooting of a United Healthcare executive
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  Speaker 3: Crime online Sidney Sumner as the latest on the legal
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  Speaker 3: battles and the deeper implications.
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  Speaker 2: Twenty six year old Luigi Mangioni pleaded not guilty to
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  Speaker 2: charges of murder and terrorism in a Manhattan courtroom. Mangioni
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  Speaker 2: is accused of killing Brian Thompson, CEO of United Healthcare,
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  Speaker 2: in a targeted attack last month. The Manhattan District Attorney
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  Speaker 2: filed state charges last week, including murder as an act
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  Speaker 2: of terrorism, while federal prosecutors pursue parallel charges that could
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  Speaker 2: carry the death penalty. Authority say Mangioni ambush Thompson in
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  Speaker 2: midtown Manhattan as the executive headed to an investor conference.
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  Speaker 2: Mangioni's arrest followed a five day manhunt ending out a
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  Speaker 2: Pennsylvania McDonald's. Police say he was carrying the alleged murder weapon,
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  Speaker 2: a fake ID, and a notebook expressing hostility toward wealthy
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  Speaker 2: executives and the health insurance industry. His defense team claims
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  Speaker 2: public comments from officials, including New York Mayor Eric Adams,
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  Speaker 2: have jeopardized his right to a fair trial, but Judge
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  Speaker 2: Gregory Caro assured the court that proceedings will remain impartial.
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  Speaker 2: Prosecutors described the killing as a deliberate act of terror
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  Speaker 2: designed to shock and intimidate. The crime is shaken corporate America,
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  Speaker 2: with some executives reporting an uptick in threats. Thompson, a
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  Speaker 2: twenty year old veteran of United Healthcare and a father
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  Speaker 2: of two, was remembered as a respected leader in the industry.
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  Speaker 2: The state trial is expected to proceed first, with life
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  Speaker 2: in prison without parole as the maximum sentence.
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  Speaker 3: Federal prosecutors are still weighing the possibility of seeking the
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  Speaker 3: death penalty. A woman who pleaded guilty to a nineteen
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  Speaker 3: ninety murder in which she dressed as a clown to
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  Speaker 3: kill the wife of a man she later married, has
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  Speaker 3: now been released from prison, thus ending a case deemed
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  Speaker 3: strange even by Florida standards. Sheila Keen Warren, now sixty one,
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  Speaker 3: served eighteen months following a plea deal last year for
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  Speaker 3: second degree murder in the shooting death of Marlene Warren.
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  Speaker 3: In a case full of unusual twists, authorities say Marlene
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  Speaker 3: Warren was shot by a person dressed as a clown
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  Speaker 3: who handed her balloons before pulling a gun. The crime
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  Speaker 3: remained unsolved for decades. Keen Warren, who was suspected early on,
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  Speaker 3: wasn't arrested until twenty seventeen, when updated DNA testing reportedly
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  Speaker 3: linked her to the crime scene. At the time of
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  Speaker 3: the killing, she worked for Marlene Warren's husband, Michael, and
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  Speaker 3: witnesses claimed she was having an affair with him, a
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  Speaker 3: claim both denied. Two years after the murder, Michael and
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  Speaker 3: Sheila married and eventually moved to Virginia, where they ran
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  Speaker 3: a restaurant. Sheila Keen Warren's release ends a case that
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  Speaker 3: has haunted Palm Beach County for a s over thirty years.
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  Speaker 1: Thanks John, Lakia Goldsmith, twenty, has a date ask her
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  Speaker 1: a grandmother to babysit her two year old son at
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  Speaker 1: their Montgomery, Alabama apartment. The date goes well. The couple
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  Speaker 1: says good night through the window. Lakia's grandma sees her
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  Speaker 1: getting out of the car, but she never makes it
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  Speaker 1: to the door. Around two a m. Lakira has to
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  Speaker 1: borrow a maintenance worker's phone. He steps away while she
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  Speaker 1: makes a call. When he comes back, she's gone, His
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  Speaker 1: phone left where she was standing. Lakara's family reports are missing.
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  Speaker 1: That day, searches turn up nothing. Lakia Goldsmith, African American,
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  Speaker 1: five to four long, black hair, brown eyes, last s
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  Speaker 1: wearing a black velvet dress. She's got severe asthma. She
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  Speaker 1: left her in heller behind. If you have info on
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  Speaker 1: Lakira Goldsmith, please call Montgomery, Alabama PD three three four
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  Speaker 1: six two five two eight one zero. For the latest
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  Speaker 1: crime in justice news, go to crime online dot com
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  Speaker 1: and please join us for our daily podcast, Crime Stories,
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  Speaker 1: where we do our best to find missing people, especially children,
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  Speaker 1: and solve unsolved homicides. With this crime alert, I Nancy
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  Speaker 1: Grace