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Subscribe to RSSPHILADELPHIA -- Five people are accused of imprisoning disabled adults in a dank Philadelphia basement to steal their Social Security checks, a scheme that led to the murders of two of the victims, a federal prosecutor said on Wednesday.
Each defendant in the so-called Philadelphia dungeon case faces life in prison, U.S. Attorney Zane David Memeger said at a press conference to unveil the 196-count indictment.
The alleged ringleader, Linda Weston, 52, also could face the death penalty because she is charged with two counts of murder in aid of racketeering, Memeger said.
The indictment said her actions - chaining captives to a furnace, putting drugs in their food to subdue them and other means - had resulted in the death of two captives.
"The conduct here is shocking," Memeger said.
The indictment accuses the basement captors of racketeering to steal disability payments from adults with the mental capacity of a 10-year-old.
Memeger said the thefts amounted to $212,000 over 10 years.
Four of the defendants, including Weston and her daughter, had been charged with state crimes stemming from the scheme. A fifth, Nicklaus Woodward, of West Palm Beach, Fla., was arrested in Florida on Wednesday, Memeger said.
It is unclear, Memeger said, whether the original four will still face state as well as federal charges.
The malnourished captives were discovered in October 2011 by a landlord during a routine check of the two-story apartment house in the working class Tacony neighborhood. Authorities said two of those held had been imprisoned for roughly 11 years.
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what these digusting people will get, will probably not be enuf...
It's bad enough they're taking over the City, now a new low even for them!
they should end up like gary hiednik.
more disgusting will be the bottom dwelling lawyers that will jump to kiss thier ass and defend them...............
Them? Who excactly is them?
Everyone is entitled to an adequate defense regardless of what crime they are accused of. Maybe you should spend a little time reading something other than the ingredients of a cereal box.
They are all black. Erik Holder will surely find some loophole to get them off. They should all be executed, not put in prison to cost us vermin storage fees for the next 50 years.
The punishment should fit the crime. Chains, damp basement, little or no food. But noooooo, we can't violate THEIR civil rights, can we. We must make sure that these criminals are NOT denied food, are NOT denied water, and are NOT denied appropriate shelter. MUST have toilets and sinks in their cells. No chains, and weekly exercising. Does this seem completely ridiculous to anyone else?
The low life family stole PEOPLE and their checks to live off of. And now they are stealing tax dollars from Americans so they can continue to live for free. Where is the punishment? Why do we ignore the crime, ignore the victim?
Eye for an eye
@cory1980 Each one has a 196-count indictment against them and are facing LIFE. From the looks of them, should be at least 20-30 years. They aren't going to the minimum security country club for white collar Enron CEO's. They'll be at state "pound you in the a$$" prison. And the ring leader is facing the death penalty (which i disagree with because it ends the life of misery in prison too quickly)
@D.Man, @tstucker0958 - racist much?
@monkeymonkey I understand your perspective, just do not agree. Those of us that live in PA and pay taxes will be paying for their meals, doctor exams, etc. I don't like it one bit.
I know nothing of the laws in pennsylvania but I thought that if a human is held against their will, that is kidnapping under federal law?
Um monkey, isn't it just as racist, to back one race or the other, as it is to oppose one or the other?
Veteran, you're absolutely right. She deserves her day in court as does every one. But when she's found guilty, she deserves to be taken out back and shot.
What I want to know is this concerning that guy who only got 5 years in jail for beating his wife to death to save money on a divorce who was in the news recently - why'd he only get 5 years in jail while this group gets life in jail or death? He got parole because he was such a nice guy during 5 years in jail - the pecker-wood beat his wife to death purposely to save money... what can be more cold-blooded than that?! Don't get me wrong, this group of degenerates deserve to be locked away forever or executed as well!!!
Oh, wait - that guy was wealthy!!! Silly me, different rules and laws apply!!!
It's people like this that just really need a tall tree and a short rope around their necks.
200,000 in 10 years ? between the 5 of them they could have collected welfare and got more money. and a Obama phone to boot
it was just a test run of obama care...oh that's right he don't care...
IWonder,
Where the he#* do you get the racism remark from? How was monkeymonkey supporting or saying anything about race? Were you meaning the "minimum security country club for white collar Enron CEO's" comment? There is no mention of race in that sentence. Unless you mean that all Enron CEO's and the type, have to be white? If so you just showed us all where you stand.
I stand for equality under the law, always have. How about you?
deereigna
You mean a white collar doesn't actually have a white neck, does that mean that a redneck's neck isn't actually red?
i stand for nothing and fall for every thing...some say i'm a joker...i'm a smoker...i'm a mid night toker...but nobody calls me mauris...cause just a damn old troll...
2little2late: And what would you say to their public defender?
Everyone gets a lawyer, no matter what. It's their job to defend the client, no matter what.
That said, I hope that defense lawyer loses because these people need to be put away forever. No parole.
@D.Man, @tstucker0958 - racist much?
Uh, actually you are. Where did I mention anything about color in my post, you racist.
How did they keep somebody in a dungeon for 11 daggone years & nobody questioned where that person was???? Why did the landlord not know for 10-11 yrs? He just decided one day to go to the basement to check stuff....once every ten yrs a landlord decides to check out his basement in rental property. The family of the victims need to be questioned as to WHY someone can be gone 5 to 10 yrs, with the mental capacity of a 10 yr old, and you don't put in a missing persons, or ask around, or look for them? They could have found them through the social security office...maybe they need to start making people that receive ss, ssi, ssdi go into the office every year or two to make sure they are still around/alive. A lot of people keep their deceased relatives checks for years, and when you go to prison it stops. Something needs to change...if you have a payee, they should be the one to go and take them with them. They are too relaxed with the system...
Im sorry. I am the mother of a child with a mental disability. This woman deserves nothing but the same thing done to her. I can't imagine the fear and pain these people lived in. I believe in our judicial system as one of the best in the world. However, this is the lowest of low. I wanted to throw up when I read this story.
there are so many loopholes that would allow this to happen. adults with mental disabilites can get another adult as their caretaker, that person can be signed over as power of atteny, that person can even meet with a state caseworker or other regulator and show the home and make it look like they are caring for the person. some of the female captives were forced into prostution, i doubt the whole take over ten years was for a measely 212,000. that is prob what they got just in estimated checks. basements sometimes have crawl spaces in them, boiler rooms, back odd spaces for tenant storage and adults with mental capacity of a ten year old look different from us--out of it, drooling, ill, not aware--her drugging these people would not be noticed very easily in a working class neighborhood. this woman found her meal ticket early on and the families of these adults more than likely trusted them in the care of the state. when a family decides it can not bear the burden of care for a child or adult with a severe disability, they can give that responsbility to the state, who then may place the adult in a group home or private home to live.the adults state check then goes to what ever agency is 'caring' for them. in this case, this woman prob found loop holes or befriended families to take their disabled family member. if you have an adult with a ten year mental capacity or younger then communication is limited.talking on the phone with a mrdd adult is next to impossible. over the years,the family members just assumed their mrdd adult was with this woman or in a state program and was getting what they needed. this woman may have even given 'reports' that their family member was fine or made stuff up about their activities--all while keeping them captor somewhere while she cashed checks. or these poor people came from low income or low care situations where the door was closed behind them as soon as they found a taker.
this woman and her gang killed two people, forced mrdd women into prostitution, saw peopple as slaves to be used and took an already disadvantaged person who may not have never known love in their life from being born with severe mrdd and made life even more of a hell.there is nothign short of death penalty for all these people that is deserved. we do not know the fear or agony or sickness these people endured at the hands of their years entrapped with this monster. give this woman and her whole gang death.
Authorities should be more cautious about people who don't work or are very low income having large amounts of money in the bank or the ability to cash a few SS checks. They should also have landlords check their buildings more often or have case working checking in on seniors and the disabled regularly. Hopefully, these creeps will end up for years in prison, yet they'll be treated humanely unfortunately.
like landlords and caseworkers have NOTHING else to do , the social security, diability and human services people will all cry budget cuts have left them severely understaffed and they can't possibly free up any of their people to be babysitting the elderly and disabled and as far as the landlord goes, as long as he was getting his money, he had no reason to check up on his tennants, i would assume nobody called anything in broken he was getting his check the first of the month, no need to pursue what aint broke
That definition could be somebody who inherited a lot of money as well though.
$200K across 10 years is hardly a lot of money. I seriously doubt any of these people had a bulging bank account if they had one at all. Five people living off this and they had to spend at least a little to keep their captors alive. Even though they obviously weren't taking very good care of these people, it almost seems like it would be a bigger job than making about the same money as a WalMart greeter.
This was of course horrible, but what does it say about our society when people would do something like this for so little gain? These people are just pure evil. Sometimes I think we should just build a big containment center somewhere out West in a warm but desolate climate with big electric fences and a bunch of basic pole barn type buildings. Drop these worst of the worst people in for the rest of their lives and air drop in food and water every week. Leave them to fend for themselves. Whatever happens inside is none of our business.
City of Brotherly Love...
But not all of the villains in the story were from Philadelphia. At least one was from Florida.
give Floriduh a shout out...HEY ONE OF YA'LL ESCAPED...
11 years???? OMG so sad for these special people.
Just when you think you've heard the worst case of depravity!! Some one steps up? or digs down to a new low.
I am all in favor of making criminals live and or die in exactly the same manner as their victims. The law, though, states no cruel or unusual punishment, but I say let the criminals decide their punishment by their own actions against their victims. I say chain these people up and make them live under the same conditions as their victims and since 2 of them died, they must live in these conditions until their own deaths. Maybe, with punishments like this, criminals will think twice about their actions!
Put yer nuke suits on, people! This is gonna be a true episode of "Defcon 4" THIS is going to be the New American Economy, SOON!
Uhh, 4 is the second lowest DEFCON.
Why are there so many idiots who want to blame crap like this on the economy, or Obama? Do you think all this just started happening in the last 4 years? Go run your political BS on a political story, and quit trolling for things you can blame on Obama. It's crap like this that made people realize we needed to vote for him in the first place. You guys keep showing your butt and make reasonable people realize something is wrong with you. No one will take you seriously if it continues. Watch.
deer; though his comment was out in left field I do not see one mention of Obama, I guess you must either think you are Obama's personal support on this site or you are feeling a little guilty and think Obama has something to do with this!!!!!!
I doubt very seriously if crap like this had anything to do with why people voted for Obama!
As disgusting and depraved as this is, there's a hidden story here somewhere.... it's about how all these people managed to skim was $212,000 over 10 years. Social security payments for disabled people must be on the far side of pathetic.
Lock them up and throw away the key.
Social security payments for disabled people must be on the far side of pathetic: yes they are yet to hear others spin it the peeps on disability are living high on the hog NOTHING could be further from the truth.....SMDH!!!
Gee I am disabled trying to survive on the windfall I get every month. I worked and paid into social security for 30 years before becoming disabled so I earned my SSDI. I am trying to raise my grandson on less than $13,000 a year and a whole $55 a month in foodstamps for the both of us. I get no financial help to raise my grandson and I depend on Medicaid to be able to take him to a doctor. I pay my Medicare premiums off the top of my check every month and then if I get so sick that I am on death's doorstep before I will even spend the money to go to a doctor I have to come out of my pocket the 20% just like everyone else does. But the National Debt and the cost of two unpaid for wars are my fault because I am nothing but a taker!!!!! Do you have any idea of how much it hurts me to tell my grandson I can't afford the apple he wants or that he can't have grapes because they are too expensive??? Bitter, yes I am. When you stop the oil company and corporate welfare payments and bring our soldiers home and stop invading countries that did nothing to us, then you can ask me to give up something. The same goes for the people that have lost their jobs because corporations shipped their jobs to China and all they can get is a minim wage job. If they can even get one of those jobs or more like two, if the can get 40 hours a week they still only make $15,000 a year. Do the math, $7.25 x 40 x 52 = $15,080 a year. Gee I guess you say work harder, that $15,080 is probaby working two jobs to get the 40 hours a week, maybe they should just get four jobs. Yes I am bitter!!!
Im not trying to be rude but how did this horrid story become about you and what you are bitter about? If you can't afford grapes how exactly are you paying to be on the computer?
I wish you would post a picture of these people...I like to see what kind of person would do this to another.
They are African American so it might be considered racist profiling for a news organization to post their pictures.
Bill H,
"I wish you would post a picture of these people..."
Be careful of what you wish for! You might not like what you see.
A picture won't tell you "what kind of people" they were, but it might let you gloat in your racism.
It's no more racist then displaying their pictures if the were White. News services don't alwasy do it and it seems that only racists worry about it. Besides this is a followup to an earlier posted story from last year.
Rick would probably turn them loose just to show what a good little lib he is.
tstucker- Stop trying to bend this into a political discussion. There is nothing here that is political.
3ric...scum taking from public funds for their own enrichment...that doesn't sound like anything a politician would do...what state do ya live in ...Bliss...
No where in the article does it say any one was black. These comments just prove that you are racists by assuming that only a black person can do something like this. I can't believe the hate white people in this country have for non whites. It makes me ashamed to be white.
tstucker0958: What Rick did was show he's an objective, fair, and wise person, who aims before he shoots.
Didn't your momma teach you not to judge a book by its cover?
Catholic priests who molest little boys look like upstanding gentleman, but we know otherwise.
PS: Sorry most of America doesn't agree with your politics anymore.
A few posts have stated that the perpetrators were African-American... where in the article is this stated as fact? America is such a racist and violent culture... but its part your 'liberty' to hate isn't it? Ask most African- or native Americans if they feel liberated? Americans really enjoy a rush to judgment and call it justice. Just ask Bruno Hauptmann or Lee Oswald!
Just FYI the lady was black.
http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.getingo.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Linda-Weston-captive-beatrice-weston.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.getingo.com/linda-weston-holds-niece-beatrice-weston-captive-in-a-dungeon-for-10-years-in-philadelphia/&h=220&w=174&sz=9&tbnid=11wZgpMzeuwmAM:&tbnh=90&tbnw=71&prev=/search%3Fq%3DLinda%2BWeston%26tbm%3Disch%26tbo%3Du&zoom=1&q=Linda+Weston&usg=__lk7xeP-SyQqNwsQFF9cVZPRx8KA=&docid=l-LOqZCsNfH9FM&sa=X&ei=YHQQUfKRHamU2QW1m4DYDQ&ved=0CEoQ9QEwBA
They are replacing her attorney and possibly providing a back up to consult with the other. WASTE OF TAX PAYER MONEY!
The people who were victimized were disabled? Where were their caretakers when this was going on? I was under the impression that someone would look in on a person on his/her own that had debilitating disabilities. I remember reading this story when it originally broke, but thought as usual, that the press was premature in its accusations, and just put the matter under the rug. But, here we are again. Sometimes it is really difficult to believe that we are living in the 21st Century, modern America, and behavior like this is going on. What do future elderly and/or disabled people have to look forward to? I am really disgusted.
Unbelievable the inhumanity of these people! So many sad examples of this we keep reading of in the news.
It's Obama's fault!
Welcome to the bright new future we are moving FORWARD to encompass! Coming to an economy close to your home soon!
That landlord didn't inspect his building much over those 11 years if this is how it was discovered ---during a "routine inspection"?
Picture a 10 year old you know, their exuberance, their innocence, their trust. These adults were no different. Now imagine that person chained up for 11 years. Everyone involved should be locked up for the rest of their lifes.
Put to death... I live in PA, so my taxes will be used for these degenerates to continue to live for free. 3 hots and a cot for them, damp basement and chains for the victims. Ahhhh justice...
Rick 881466
Very, very well said. My child has Downs Syndrome, and I agree your discription of what the innocent victims are probably like. I wish you could be there to advise the jury at their trials.
There is a special place in hell for people who would take advantage of such helpless victims.
I hope there is!! I pray there is!!!
Could seek the death penalty - there should be no doubt. Too bad they can't be chained up and treated the way they treated those poor people.
Well, here's another case of bad reporting...I understand some people will write anything and post it on the internet so they can call themselves reporters. But let's look at this...These people are charged with the theft in the amout of $212,000, Two of these people claim the have been imprisoned for 11 years. Does that mean they were only getting about $5,000 a year in SS befefits? And you divide that by the 5 people who were charged with the crimes, they would be better off getting a job at WalMart, instead of a scheme like this.
I did the math even as I was reading the story. Basically $4,000 per victim, split 5 ways over the course of the offense.
The criminal brain is seldom first rate, and the term "criminal genius" is an oxymoron devised by fiction writers.
But, at the end, they do get the free room and board, clothing, cable TV, free college if they wish, conjugal visits (?). The best I can hope for these jackasses is a "shank."
BTW - do you think this was their only criminal enterprise?
"they would be better off getting a job at WalMart, instead of a scheme like this"
EXACTLY
Sick, sick, sick. No punishment too harsh for these sub-humans.
Chain them to a wall for 11 years, feed them only 500 calories a day then put a bullet in them.
Ah, a "parole" program I could support.
This happened in Sacramento in the 1980's, a supposedly sweet old lady killed and buried elderly people in her yard for their soc sec checks.
Lot's of sick people in the world.
It is a bad world out there, huh?
The perps in this case will get what they deserve, or as close to it as the law allows.
But tomorrow, next week, or next year there will be another case like it, not in all its details, but in the willingness of somebody to horribly mistreat the helpless for financial gain.
Did this to a mental disabled person for 11 years? Those people should not get life, they should be put to death. Evil.
Targeting the diasabled and imprisoning the for 10 years in a dungeon with chains and little food or water?
And how's the perp's life sentence going to look like? Three hots, a cot, free internet, TV, library, education, and health care for all of them; all provided by the taxpayer: the victims of their crimes.
These sickos should be hanged in public.
Give them an attorney, fair trial, convict them and then execute all of them!
I would normally say all of these @!$%#bags need to be put to death but instead, they need life without parole and they should be chained in their cells 23 hours and fifty minutes a day and only released for ten minutes to clean the cracks of their asses!
They don't deserve even 10 minutes a YEAR out of chains.