Robert Scott - Unholy Sacrifice

Table of Contents

A CKNOWLEDGMENTS

Many people helped me in the creation of this book. Id like to thank Don Wilson, Chris Darden, Ray and Mabel Carberry, Juley Salkeld, Roger Riddle and Rosanne Lusk Urban, J. Lawrence, D. Golden, G. Tardelli and B. Tweed. Id also like to thank Tom Moyer, Mike Harkelroad, Howard Newman, the entire staff of Department Four and Criminal Court clerks. Once again, I appreciate all the help of my editor Michaela Hamilton and literary agent Damaris Rowland.

E PILOGUE

In March 2005, Taylor and Justins sister, Heather, tried to make sense of how things had gone so terribly wrong. She began to write her thoughts down on paper beginning with their youth.

Childhood

Taylor and Justin were best friends from childhood. I remember them riding their big-wheels (and later bicycles) off to grand adventures, making elaborate setups with their plastic toy soldiers, and running off to play too fast for me to catch up with them. I remember them being super-heroes, wrestling, and stick-fighting each other. We did occasionally play together. I remember Go Fish, Candyland, and Chutes and Ladders. Taylor and Justin were unusually nice brothers. For example, they never hit me which would have actually been normal sibling behavior. As for fighting, neither of them ever started a fight with other children. I remember Justin coming home from elementary school after losing a fight though. It made the world seem scary but Taylor stepped in the next day and Justin didnt get another bully lesson. I dont remember Taylor ever getting into a physical fight. All Taylors fights were verbal and he always seemed to win them. When Taylor was twelve and Justin was ten, they both shared a paper route for a couple of years. I remember that Taylor spent all of his money and that Justin saved almost all of his. Justin bought the bicycle he had wanted and being content, quit the paper route. I believe all three of us were more self-reliant than average children since once mother hit her late teens she found that she was ill about half the time. If she could be induced to see a psychologist, I am confident that she would be diagnosed as psychosomatic. Probably like Taylor and Justin, I was about ten when I realized that she actually wasnt dying and that although her sick days represented some challenges caring for ourselves, they were also opportunities to do whatever we wanted. Please note that half the time our mother was very present in our lives, playing, teaching, hugging, listening, etc. It is just that half the time she wasnt and since our father held so firmly to the idea that women were to take care of children, and men were to earn the money, he didnt bother to notice the situation.

Adolescence

Taylor was able to make friends and girlfriends easily, and since Justin didnt make friends easily, Justin was more than willing to make do with being Taylors brother. Interestingly, despite their close ages, they never attended high school together. Justin was home-schooled for eighth grade and his Freshman year. When Justin began his Sophomore year at Ygnacio

Valley High, Taylor had decided to test out of high school and begin college a year early. Taylor lasted a semester at college. As for Justin at high school, he became a self-styled nerd. He might have been labeled such anyway, but he played it like it was his Oscar role. He actually sought out hazing and ridicule and his classmates willingly gave it. Justins social behavior was outrageous and he was shunned except for two other boys who did not speak English well and had their own troubles being accepted. As his sister, I was angry with him for being super-geek when I knew how nice he was at home. Like many teenagers though, I thought my friends were supposed to be the focus of my life and beyond privately telling Justin that I thought he was being dumb, left him to himself. My parents never knew how high school was going for Justin. However, adolescence was the time our family did more things together because our father noticed that we were not children anymore and therefore more enjoyable. As a family we watched movies, went camping, played video games, went to the library, and occasionally ate dinner together as I had finally learned to cook.

River Rafting

In the summer of 1991 my father, thankfully, skipped the mid-life crisis many men go through and instead found a hobby he couldnt do without, in river rafting. Not only that, by the time we reached young adulthood, Dad had realized that Taylor, Justin and I were some of his favorite people, that he absolutely loved us, and that he was willing to tell us so. By the summer of 1992, Dad had gone to guide school, had all the equipment, and was rafting every Saturday. Since our whole family enjoyed rafting, we joined him much of the time. River rafting was definitely our family thing. Our river of choice was the American. Some days wed do the upper fork, some days the lower fork, some days wed do both. After going through Troublemaker, the biggest rapid on the upper fork, wed pull the rafts over, climb onto the rocks, and have lunch while we watched other rafts go through it. There were plenty of jump off spots to use to cool us off without getting in the paths of rafts that werent stopping, so it was a great time for water play. And of course, the scenery was fantastic. River rafting was a part of my familys life heavily in the early 1990s, frequently in the later 1990s, but virtually stopped after 2000.

How did this happen?

In short, the answer would be Taylor. The complete answer includes five factors, where if any had not been present, I doubt murder would have happened.

The first ingredient was Taylors natural charismatic personality. To date, I have never met anyone like him. He was certainly the most interesting person in our family and we willingly gave him center stage. He could talk so convincingly, had genuinely great ideas, and had a talent for making anyone feel special. All of us expected him to do great things in his life and he expected to do so as well.

The second ingredient was the history of mental illness on our mothers side of the family. Our grandmother was suicidal, our grandmothers sister was institutionalized much of her life and had children who were likewise institutionalized. We have had several close relatives (aunts, uncles, cousins) who have been institutionalized or diagnosed as mentally disabled. Out of the nine children of my maternal grandparents that reached adulthood, many, including my mother, find it challenging to care for themselves and function in roles such as employee or parent or spouse.

The third ingredient was our family religion. The Church of Christ of Latter Day Saints. We were a very religious family and Taylor and Justin definitely used the teachings, which ranged from being honest and giving service, to no sex before marriage and no alcohol, as the foundation of their morality. When they lost that foundation by leaving their religion (Taylor in 1995 and Justin in 1996), they began a process of establishing new principals to live by and appeared to be stagnating in life in terms of education, careers and relationships. However, Taylor and Justin still held to some of the concepts of our religion which included Jesus Christs establishing a church while on earth, that there was a falling away from the truths that He taught, that a prophet was called to restore those truths, that we have a prophet today, and that Jesus Christ will return to earth someday amid great turbulence. These concepts of course were to become the core of their delusion with Taylor being a restorer of Gods truth.