LANCASTER COUNTY, PA - "Why? Why did you do this? You sentenced me to 17 to 40 years in prison for something I didn't mean to do. I've never been in trouble a day in my life. Seventeen years! That's my whole life!"
The occasion of his sentencing was, according to newspaper reports, the only time Michael T. Butler, 20, expressed any real emotion during his murder trial.

The victim was 2-year-old Vance "Dukie" McNeil, the son of Butler's girlfriend, Dierdre McNeil. A little more than a year ago, on Aug. 6, 2003, she left Vance and his sister in Butler's care when she went to work at Wal-Mart in Parkesburg. Nine hours later, when Butler picked her up, the boy appeared to be asleep in his car seat. Dierdre McNeil reached back and shook the boy. He fell over, dead.

Butler's sentence, handed down last week by Lancaster County Judge James P. Cullen, angered his family. "My son did not murder that baby," Butler's mother, Wanda Fields Barrett, told the Intelligencer Journal. "He's never been in any trouble. He's always been a good boy."

But the toddler died after being beaten so severely that his brain and nearly every internal organ were damaged.

And that crime, a year ago, was a disturbing harbinger.

Over the course of the last 12 months, 11 kids have been killed in Lancaster County. It is, officials say, likely a record.

It's also thought to be a statistical blip. On average, two to four children are murdered annually in this county; as many were killed in the five-year span from 1998 to 2002 as have died in the past year.

There does not appear to be anything connecting the deaths; as deputy coroner Dr. James Beittel, who works with pediatric cases, noted, "It's not as if someone's passing around a text, 'How to Murder Children.' "

But there are similarities. The recent slayings break down into two camps, said a local attorney who has defended clients accused of killing kids. There are those killed by a parent, and those who, like Vance McNeil, wind up dead at the hands of a "paramour," a boyfriend or new husband who is not the child's father.

In virtually all of the recent cases, the perpetrator is described as Butler's family described him: a good person, perhaps even a good father. But the paramour doesn't always have a lot of experience with kids. And when frustration builds up, something snaps, and a child lies dead.

Assistant District Attorney Heidi Eakin prosecuted Butler; she prosecutes most of the child homicide cases in Lancaster County. It would be easier, she said, if there were some definitive connection; that way, it would be easier to stop it.

Ultimately, she keeps coming back to the term evil.

"I can't fathom what other emotion you could attach to it," she said.

And in April, in a case tragically reminiscent of the Amanda Yates case in Texas, officials say Meaghan Lippiatt, 28, of East Donegal Township, suffocated her two young boys, Silas, 2, and Myles, 4 months. Officials discovered the dead children after Lippiatt reportedly called 911 and told a dispatcher, "I did something really bad. I just killed my kids."

Lippiatt, who spent weeks in a mental hospital after being arrested, last month waived her right to a preliminary hearing and will stand trial.

And there is one unsolved, and thus unexplained, case: That of "Baby Allison," the newborn found dead in a Strasburg trash barrel in December. The child's throat had been slit; police have few leads, and the case has gone cold.

The other seven children died at the hands of a paramour, a flame past or present. Four kids - the Birster children: Andrew, 10, Taylor, 9, Brianna, 7, and Kirsten, 4 - died in a fire that police say was set by their mother's ex-boyfriend, Francisco David, on Aug. 22, 2003. David reportedly denied setting the fire; the case is scheduled to go before a jury this month.

Dixie-Anna Spencer and Karissa Lynn Shaub died in the same manner as Vance McNeil; brutalized by a male caregiver who, for whatever reason, just lost it.

Dixie-Anna, 2, was killed by her stepfather, Robert Hildebrand, who last month pleaded guilty to third-degree murder. Hildebrand, described by Dixie-Anna's great aunt Katie Gordon as a "good father," was frustrated because the toddler had a cold and wouldn't stay in her room; at 5:30 a.m. on Oct. 28, 2003, Hildebrand kicked the toddler in the stomach, pulled her into a coffee table, hit her with the back of his hand, struck her in the head with his knuckles and slammed her head into the floor several times.

Heidi Eakin, the assistant district attorney, keeps a photo of Dixie-Anna in her office. "That girl," she said, "died a horrible death."

Karissa Lynn Shaub, 7 months, was also the victim of frustration; the last of the 11 children to die during the past year, police said she was killed June 14, after she suffered massive internal injuries, including a torn liver and internal bleeding. The boyfriend of mother Tiffany R. Shaub, Joseph M. Murray, 21, of East Drumore Township, has been charged with criminal homicide; police said he became angry with the infant after she vomited on him; he placed her on a mattress and inserted one of his fingers into her anus.

Murray's preliminary hearing was held last month, at which he pleaded not guilty. Said his grandmother, Beulah Deaver: "My boy loved that baby and wanted to adopt her. It's not an intentional thing that happened, but now it's being blown up into a brutal murder."

Others chalk it up to strained or failed relationships and the attendant resentment; by the time friends and family realize something is wrong, it's too late.

In almost all of the cases, "the defendants are not out to kill anyone," said the local defense attorney, who asked to remain anonymous because of his involvement in several cases. "These are tough cases because they are not about abuse; [The accused] are not people who have lived their lives as criminals. It's displaced anger ... and the situation can become extremely explosive, all of a sudden."

Katie Gordon, Dixie-Anna Spencer's great aunt, recalls that just prior to the toddler's death, the girl's mother had undergone knee surgery; the bulk of the household duties fell upon stepfather Hildebrand.

Frustration set in; Dixie-Anna may have died because it built up.

"This was a normal person with a conscience and support within the family," Gordon said of Hildebrand. "He could have picked up the phone at any time, I would have taken that child for a month. But he never spoke up."

Shortly after Dixie-Anna's death, Gordon and two friends started a memorial fund in her name to raise awareness about child abuse issues. As the months passed, Gordon admitted, their enthusiasm began to wane. Then Karissa Lynn Shaub died much the way Dixie-Anna did.

"I thought, we can't stop," said Gordon. "This almost seems like an epidemic."

There was, in other words, no intent. Butler, as he said, did not mean to kill Vance McNeil; none of the seven kids killed by paramours were "meant" to die.

They died, nonetheless, and it's Eakin's job to put the killers behind bars. It is, she acknowledged, emotionally draining; she suggested that when the public learns the details of one upcoming case, people might be left speechless; "Worse than a horror film," was how she put it.

Killing a child "is so contrary to human nature," she said, and that can make it hard to get a conviction; even juries don't want to believe that someone would beat a child so severely as to damage internal organs. And worst, perhaps, is the fact that even obtaining a conviction might be of little solace to the family that buries the child.

"I've seen family after family walk out of the courtroom, and it's almost anticlimactic," she said.

"It's almost as if they want me to fix it. And I can't fix it."

Text of article Lancaster, PA Sunday News
August 15, 2004

Grieving Grandfather
Gil Smart

LANCASTER COUNTY, PA - In Cliff Spencer’s Landisville driveway sits a pontoon boat covered with a tarp. His family, he said, spends a lot of time on the water. His granddaughter used to steer the boat.

“I’d sit Dixie-Anna on my lap and she’d say, ‘No, Grandpa, I don’t need help,’” recalled Spencer, 48, with a wistful smile.

Dixie-Anna’s birthday was Aug. 2; she would have been 3, had she lived.

In September, Spencer’s former son-in-law, Robert Hildebrand, will be sentenced for killing the toddler, his stepdaughter. In July, Hildebrand admitted he beat and kicked the child to death Oct. 28. He pleaded guilty to third-degree murder. He couldbe out of prison in 20 years, or less.

Spencer doesn’t think that’s justice. “Why should it be,” he asks, “that someone who kills a child should be out of jail before that child would have graduated from high school?”

And so the young grandfather and former volunteer firefighter has launched a campaign to toughen Pennsylvania law when it comes to those who kill children. He would like to see the state adopt a law similar to one in South Carolina, where those who kill children face a minimum of 25 years in jail.

He’s bounced the idea off local prosecutors and made his case to a local legislator, who says she likes the idea – but warns that the process of changing the law can be a long haul.

“I agree that we need to do something,” said state Rep. Katie True, “but it’s going to take a lot of work,” particularly given the fact that some lawmakers, now, are beginning to question the wisdom of mandatory minimum sentences.

Spencer is undeterred. “I have got the time,” he said.

“It’s time I would have spent with my granddaughter.”

Seen as monster

Everybody, it seems, has this idea of a person who would murder a child as a monster.

But Spencer had been pretty close to his son-in-law and had considered him something of a nice guy.

They played poker together, spent time on the Susquehanna River. And when a police officer – whom Spencer knew from his years as a firefighter – told him that police believed Hildebrand had killed the little girl, “I didn’t believe it.”

In retrospect, he said, he might have noticed that Hildebrand was near his breaking point. He had been working a lot of overtime; Christine Spencer, Cliff’s daughter and Dixie-Anna’s mother, had knee surgery, and Hildebrand had to pick up the slack around the house.

Dixie-Anna was sick, awake in the middle of the night, and wouldn’t stay in her room. Hildebrand, by all accounts, just snapped.

After Hildebrand was arrested, Spencer had the chance to talk to him, the two men, alone. “If you think that wasn’t tough ...” he said, his voice trailing off.

But his years as a firefighter, he said, taught him how to “compartmentalize” his grief. Instead of wallowing in it, “I started to look at what was going on and what could be done to solve the problem.”

Between 1998 and 2002, 11 children were killed in Lancaster County; 11 more have died over the course of the past 12 months. According to the Pennsylvania Department of Health, 223 children age 14 and under were victims of homicide between 1997 and 2001.

Tough cases

And it struck Spencer that while several crimes are today deemed heinous enough to require special provisions – think hate crimes – Pennsylvania has no law specifically pertaining to the murder of a child. In cases which do not involve prolonged abuse, where the suspect simply “snaps,” prosecutors say it’s tough, if not impossible to prove premeditation. Ultimately, a third-degree murder conviction – carrying a maximum penalty of 20 to 40 years in prison – is the toughest sentence prosecutors and victims’ families can hope for.

Spencer started wondering how other states handle similar cases. He was particularly impressed by what he saw in South Carolina.

In that state, “homicide by child abuse” is defined as causing the death of a child under age 11 via “an act or omission by any person which causes harm to the child’s physical health or welfare.” The offense, a felony, is punishable by a minimum of 20 years in prison and a maximum of a life sentence.

Laura Hudson, public policy coordinator for the South Carolina Victims’ Assistance Network, said the law came about because “we recognized a gap in the law. ... Frequently [when someone murders a child] the response will be, ‘I know I took a child by the legs and threw her up against a wall, but it was an act of frustration, I didn’t mean to kill her,’” said Hudson. “It was difficult to get those cases taken up by prosecutors” as murder cases rather than involuntary manslaughter.

“I think there was a failure to understand how someone could be so damn evil.”

Hudson said the law also was driven by the belief that the death of children should be treated differently, “instead of trying to mash child issues through an adult criminal system.”

But the process took years, innumerable public hearings, a tremendous amount of research. “When you go into the general assembly, you’ve got to establish that there is a need, you’ve got a gap” in the law, she said.

“It can be the challenge of a lifetime,” she said. Spencer says he’s up for it.

Chance to testify

Rep. True has said there’s a chance that the Pennsylvania Commission on Sentencing could meet in Lancaster this fall; if it does, she hopes Spencer might get a chance to testify.

He’s met with local law enforcement officials and hopes to make his case before local civic groups.

“It’s not going to help me” to change the law now, he acknowledged. “But it might help someone else down the road.”

True acknowledges that a mandatory minimum sentence may be a tough sell in an era where such sentences are beginning to be scrutinized. Opponents of mandatory minimums say such laws remove discretion from the hands of judges and prevent them from considering extenuating circumstances.

Still, “I think we definitely need to have a discussion about this and not politicize it,” said Rep. True. “I don’t think people in our society are taking children seriously enough.

“And if nothing else, this would send a message.”

Text of Article
Lancaster, PA New Era
September 29, 2004

Mountville man who kicked child to death gets 20 to 40 years
By Janet Kelley
Lancaster New Era

LANCASTER COUNTY, PA - A Lancaster judge today imposed the maximum sentence of 20 to 40 years in prison on a Mountville man who admitted beating and kicking his 2-year-old stepdaughter to death.

If Robert Eugene Hildebrand is to gain forgiveness for this child’s death, Judge Michael J. Perezous said before imposing sentence, “it is to be from a higher authority than me.’’

Hildebrand, 30, 167 E. Main St., pleaded guilty earlier to third-degree murder for the death of his stepdaughter, Dixie-Anna Spencer, telling police he became frustrated with the child because she couldn’t sleep and wouldn’t stay in her own bedroom.

He later confessed to kicking the toddler in the stomach, hitting her several times and slamming her head on the floor several times. Her injuries were described by one official as the worst he had ever seen.

This morning, Hildebrand wept throughout the sentencing proceeding, telling the judge that to say he’s sorry, “sounds so hollow.’’

“So many lives have been utterly destroyed by this,’’ Hildebrand said, “I never meant to hurt her. I loved Dixie. I dream about her. I miss her. ... I miss everybody.’’

The child’s mother, Christine Spencer, had her father, Clifford, read aloud a letter to the judge, telling him how her child’s death has impacted her life.

“She was my life, my soul my everything,’’ the elder Spencer read from his daughter’s letter. “She was an angel sent from God.’’

Hildebrand’s attorney, Samuel Encarnacion, told the judge there was no defense for this crime, but asked Perezous to take into consideration his client’s good work history, lack of a criminal record and acceptance of responsibility.

In addition, Encarnacion said, Hildebrand was working 60 hours a week at the time, as well as doing most of the child care, “and was being caught up in life’s pressures.’’

Clifford Spencer told the judge that at any time — including 4:30 a.m. on Oct. 28 when the fatal assault took place — Hildebrand could have called any family member for help “and we would have been there in a heartbeat.’’

First Assistant District Attorney Heidi Eakin told Perezous the child’s mother was recovering from serious injuries sustained in a car accident and was heavily medicated, “explaining why she didn’t hear what surely was a horrendous beating.’’

Eakin asked the judge to impose a stiff punishment, noting the severe internal and external injuries suffered by “this child — a victim in the truest sense of the word.’’

And, she added, Hildebrand “violated a duty of trust’’ by a family who had faith in him to care for this child.

The victim’s family indicated to the judge that they did not want Hildebrand’s money as restitution for the child’s funeral expenses.

Perezous told the weeping relatives seated in the spectator section of the courtroom that he understands “the love this family felt’’ for this child.

“There is no reason, no justification, no excuse for the killing of a small child,’’ Perezous said.

Text of Article
Lancaster Intelligencer Journal
September 30, 2004

'This was truly a defenseless victim'
Man sentenced to 20 to 40 years behind bars for killing his stepdaughter

By Madelyn Pennino
Intelligencer Journal

LANCASTER COUNTY, PA - A Mountville man will spend 20 to 40 years in prison for beating his 2-year-old stepdaughter to death last October.

Lancaster County Judge Michael J. Perezous, who sentenced Robert E. Hildebrand Wednesday, said the fact the crime involved a child made it especially horrendous.

"This was truly a defenseless victim," Perezous said. "I cannot escape the fact that this is a crime of violence against an innocent child."

Hildebrand, 30, pleaded guilty in July to third-degree murder in the death of Dixie-Anna Spencer. The murder occurred Oct. 28, 2003, in the Mountville home Hildebrand shared with his wife, Christine Spencer, and the child.

Sobbing, with his hands partially covering his face, Hildebrand told Perezous he was sorry for what he did.

"Any sentence isn't really just in my opinion," Hildebrand said. "I don't know where to begin. To say I'm sorry seems too shallow and so hollow. So many lives have been touched by this tragedy."

Hildebrand said he "screwed up" his life and destroyed the lives of others, but that he never meant any harm.

"If someone told me last year I would be here, I would have told them they were crazy," Hildebrand said. "I loved Dixie. It was just hard. I miss her and I miss Christine."

Mrs. Spencer's father, Clifford Spencer, read a prepared statement on his daughter's behalf as she stood at his side.

He said his daughter was too emotional to speak.

In the statement, Mrs. Spencer says to Hildebrand, "You not only took away my loving child, you took away my life. I have been given a life sentence ... never being with her or knowing what she will become."

She says Dixie-Anna's birthday was always a special day for the family: "We always had a birthday party for her. This year, we will have to go to the gravesite for her third birthday."

The anguish of losing her daughter, Mrs. Spencer says, has diminished her capacity to live a routine life: "Just to get up in the morning and not fall apart I have to take medication."

Near the end of the statement, Mrs. Spencer says she was tortured by speculation that she knew Dixie-Anna was being beaten. Mrs. Spencer says she didn't know Hildebrand was attacking Dixie-Anna because she was taking Oxycontin to relieve pain from knee surgery and was sound asleep.

Before Perezous sentenced Hildebrand, defense attorney Samuel Encarnacion asked the judge to consider Hildebrand's work ethic and the fact he took responsibility for the crime.

"He doesn't have a significant prior criminal history. He has a good employment history and the fact that he accepted responsibility are mitigating factors," Encarnacion said.

Encarnacion said the pressure of daily life also contributed to the attack, adding that Hildebrand was the "sole supporter" of the family and worked 60 hours a week.

"He had frustrations and life pressures," Encarnacion said. "Particularly that night, he couldn't deal with it. He was asked to get up and take care of the child. There were a confluence of feelings misdirected toward the most defenseless person. It was not an intentional act."

Assistant District Attorney Heidi Eakin told Perezous Dixie-Anna's injuries were horrible.

"There were definitely outward and internal injuries," Eakin said. "This is horrendous to do to a child."

Eakin also said Hildebrand violated the trust of his family. "He violated duty, trust and care, and for that reason he needs to be (held) accountable," Eakin said.

Eakin said Hildebrand told police he hit the girl between 4 and 5:30 a.m. because she had a cold and wouldn't stay in her room.

Dixie-Anna was pronounced dead at Lancaster General Hospital at 9:30 a.m. Hildebrand and Mrs. Spencer originally told doctors they didn't know why the girl died.

Autopsy results show Dixie-Anna was severely beaten and suffered internal injuries, including a torn liver.

According to court documents, Hildebrand later confessed to the killing and told police he kicked Dixie-Anna in the stomach, pulled her into a coffee table, hit her with the back of his hand, struck her in the head with his knuckles and slammed her head on the floor several times.