A Minnesota mother was found guilty of killing her six-year-old son by shooting him nine times while he sat in the back of her car.
Julissa Thaler, 28, showed no emotion as she was convicted by a Minneapolis court on Wednesday after jurors deliberated for two hours. On February 16, she will be sentenced; the conviction carries an automatic life sentence without the possibility of parole.
Prosecutors told how Eli Hart was placed in foster care due to his mother’s mental health issues – but was returned to her two weeks before she killed him – in a trial deemed so horrific that jurors were offered counseling.
Thaler was removed from custody of Eli in January 2021 after the Dakota County Social Services Department discovered she was “presenting with psychosis and hearing voices telling her to kill herself.”
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty called it “one of the most horrific cases I have encountered in 30 years working in the criminal legal system.”
The court heard that Thaler ‘bought a shotgun and learned how to use it’ shortly after the boy’s father, Tory Hart, filed papers seeking full custody.
Thaler’s internet search history included how to load a shotgun, the most powerful knockout drug, payment from life insurance if child dies, and how much blood a six-year-old can lose, The Star Tribune reported.
Robert Pikkarainen, Thaler’s boyfriend at the time, said they went shopping with Eli, then came home for pizza and a movie, and played with their kittens.
He claimed that when the child refused to go to bed, mother and son began fighting and hitting each other.
She then took the shotgun and left the apartment with the child.
Thaler was arrested five miles from her Spring Park home in Orono after a caller reported that the car she was driving had a shattered rear window and a blown-out tire.
Police saw blood on Thaler’s hand, the criminal complaint said, according to CBS News.
Phone records revealed that she shot her son in a secluded parking lot at Lake Minnetonka Regional Park.
She then drove around the area, abandoning his belongings.
She was found competent to stand trial, but after rejecting two offers from prosecutors to plead guilty to second-degree murder, including one on January 30, her charges were upgraded to first-degree murder.
First-degree murder carries an automatic life sentence without the possibility of parole.
‘I would never do that to my son,’ she said in court on January 30 when rejecting the plea deal, Fox 9 reported.
‘I want to go to trial.’
Jury selection began on January 30.
Eli’s father said his son was popular at his elementary school and dreamed of becoming a firefighter.
‘He was always really happy, outgoing, always full of energy, always,’ Hart testified, Fox 9 reports.
He is suing the authorities for returning his son to Thaler.
After the verdict, Hart thanked the detectives and justice system.
‘On behalf of Eli’s family, Tory Hart would like to thank the jury, the court, the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office, and justice partners for their hard work,’ he said.
‘This is a tragic and heartbreaking event that could have been avoided if Eli had never been returned to a dangerous home.’
source:nsemwokrom.com