Adoptee Kills Parents in California UPDATED

A fifteen-year-old boy, adopted around age five from the foster care system, is accused of strangling his parents to death on Thursday, January 26, 2012.

Susan Poff and Robert Kamin of Oakland “had dedicated their careers to helping others escape poverty, she as a physician assistant in a city-run clinic in the Tenderloin and he as a clinical psychologist for inmates in the San Francisco County Jail system.”

“But now, less than a decade after they adopted, their 15-year-old son stands accused of strangling both Poff, 50, and Kamin, 55, then hiding their bodies in the back of the family’s PT Cruiser.

Police were called to the family’s home on Athol Avenue on Friday by a co-worker who was concerned when Kamin did not show up for work.

According to an Oakland police source familiar with the case, the co-worker first called the son, who said his parents were out for a walk. Police arrived at the home Friday, spoke with the son, and didn’t find anything unusual. When the co-worker called the boy a second time later in the day, the son said he was in the bathroom and couldn’t pass the phone to his parents. Suspicious, the co-worker called police again.

Officers returned that night and noticed charring on the car, parked in front of the house, as if someone had tried to set fire to it. Then they looked inside the automobile.

Initially the son, whose name is being withheld because of his age, denied any involvement, but later told officers what had happened, authorities said. He was arrested on suspicion of murder Saturday and is being held at the Alameda County Juvenile Justice Center in San Leandro.

Co-workers said Poff and Kamin were having some arguments with their son, some of it having to do with him spending too much time in the Occupy Oakland encampment, but nothing that sounded beyond the scope of typical teenage rebelliousness.”

“”I never heard her express any fear about her kid, ever,” said Joshua Bamberger, medical director of the San Francisco Department of Public Health’s Housing and Urban Health Clinic, where Poff worked.

Advocates for the poor

The news hit hard in both San Francisco and Alameda public health communities, where Poff and Kamin spent decades as passionate advocates for the poor, as well as mentors to their younger colleagues.

Staff members gathered Saturday at Bamberger’s house to console one another, and on Sunday more left flowers at a growing memorial in front of the couple’s home near Lake Merritt. They had recently moved to the Athol Avenue home from another section of Oakland and were in the middle of a renovation. The bottom floor was gutted and held up by supports, and the kitchen was newly constructed.

“Susan was the sweetest woman at the clinic, even when she was running around like crazy serving the homeless in the Tenderloin, she’d take time out for you when you had a question,” said nurse manager Mike Arrajj of San Francisco, who stopped by the Oakland home to leave candles and flowers.

At the Housing and Urban Health Clinic, Poff saw patients and prescribed medicines. She also screened homeless applicants looking for permanent housing in one of the health department’s 1,500 Direct Access to Housing units.

“All the cops, and all the people at S.F. General knew to call her to help get someone into the system,” Bamberger said.

Her career began after graduating from UC Berkeley, when she went to El Salvador to volunteer in a health clinic. She took a job working at a low-income health clinic in New England before returning to San Francisco to work in the Haight-Ashbury Free Clinic. There she provided free health care and mentored hundreds of medical students and nurse practitioners.

Poff and Kamin, a graduate of Stanford University, met through mutual friends. Kamin’s interest in mental health came from his family, said his brother Bruce Kamin of Oakland, who worked for nearly two decades as a psychiatric social worker for Alameda County. Their father is a psychiatrist. Kamin said the family’s interest in mental health stems in part from wanting to help their oldest brother, who has a mental disability.

“This whole thing is unbelievable, but at the same time I have to believe it,” Bruce Kamin said.

“Bob was my brother and my best friend. I feel shock now, and soon I’ll feel the sorrow. Then anger could possibly come up later,” he said.

The couple adopted because they were unable to have a child of their own, and because they wanted to help a child who’d had a rough start, Kamin said. They enrolled their son in a charter school in Oakland and drove him to karate lessons, where he advanced to the level of black belt, Kamin said.

But the boy’s infatuation with violent video games was starting to give his uncle pause.

“Bob’s strength was dealing with people in jail, who are in terrible situations and very demanding. It’s too bad that his own son couldn’t benefit from that.”

Oakland couple Susan Poff, Robert Kamin mourned
[San Francisco Chronicle 1/30/12 by Meredith May]

“Police are not releasing the cause of death until a Monday autopsy nor releasing what the high school freshman’s motive may have been.”

“Officers talked to someone at the residence — they did not say whom — and since nothing appeared suspicious at the time, the officers left. But six hours later, after getting another call about a missing employee, police returned to the residence and saw a body part sticking out from beneath blankets in the couple’s car.”

Son, 15, admits killing his Oakland parents, police say
[Mercury News 1/28/12 by Harry Harris and Chris de Benedetti]

“MailOnline has learned the boy’s identity, who is a high school freshman. Police have not yet brought charges against the minor or were revealing why he allegedly murdered his parents”

Adopted boy, 15, ‘admits to murdering his prison psychologist father and physician mother before hiding the bodies in their car’
[Daily Mail 1/30/12 by Michael Zennie]

REFORM Puzzle Piece

The adoptive parents seemingly had a lot of experience in dealing with troubled children. Very, very sad.

Update: The adoptee will be charged as an adult. With that, they have disclosed his name-Moses Kamin. He “is to be arraigned today in Alameda County Superior Court in Oakland, pending the formal filing of charges by prosecutors in the deaths of Robert Kamin, 55, and Susan Poff, 50.
The boy could face two counts of murder and a special circumstance alleging he committed multiple murders. He could be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole if convicted.”

Oakland teen charged as adult in parents’ slayings
[San Francisco Chronicle 1/31/12 by Henry K. Lee]

Update 2: “A 15-year-old boy was charged as an adult Tuesday with two counts of murder in the strangling of his adoptive parents – a jail psychologist and a clinic physician’s assistant whose bodies were found stuffed in the trunk of the family car.

Moses Kamin appeared in Superior Court for an arraignment that was continued to Wednesday, when he’s expected to be assigned a lawyer. He did not enter a plea.

“Bob’s strength was dealing with people in jail, who are in terrible situations and very demanding,” Bruce Kamin said. “It’s too bad that his own son couldn’t benefit from that.”

Officers found the bodies of Kamin, 54, and Susan Poff, 50, under blankets in the back of a PT Cruiser parked outside their house in the city’s Lake Merritt district. Investigators believe the teenager had tried unsuccessfully to set the car ablaze.

Moses Kamin was arrested the next day after police said he gave a confession.

Officer Phong Tran told the Tribune the boy may have been motivated by tension with his parents over his two recent suspensions from school. He may have feared being disciplined for his latest suspension on Wednesday, Tran said.

Moses, who has a black belt in karate, first strangled his mother Thursday after the two got into an argument about the suspension, police said. He then stashed her body and waited for his father to come home from work and attacked him from behind, they said.”

Moses Kamin, Oakland Teenager, Charged In Adoptive Parents’ Murders
[Huffington Post 1/31/12]

“Officer Phong Tran said the teen may have been motivated by tension with his parents over his two recent suspensions from school. He may have feared being disciplined for his latest suspension on Wednesday, Tran said.

Prosecutors decided to charge Moses Kamin as an adult after considering the seriousness of the crimes and the fact the boy turns 16 in April, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

If convicted, he could face 50 years to life in prison.”

“When officers found the couple’s bodies in the car, it was charred as if someone tried to set it on fire, police said.

Kamin was adopted in 2002.”
“Police found the bodies of the couple outside the new house they were renovating.”

“A police source familiar with the case told the Chronicle a co-worker first called the son, who said his parents were out for a walk.

The newspaper reports that police arrived to the home near Lake Meritt in Oakland on Friday and spoke with the boy, but found nothing suspicious.

When a second call from the co-worker called the house came in, the boy reportedly said he was in the bathroom and could not pass the phone, prompting the co-worker to phone police again.

Authorities returned to the home and noticed charring on the car parked outside, which appeared as if someone had tried to set it alight.

Looking inside, they saw a limb sticking out beneath a blanket. When officer opened the car doors, they discovered Mr Kamin and Mrs Poff dead.

Initially the boy was said to have denied any involvement but later confessed to authorities, according to the Chronicle.”

“The couple adopted because they were unable to have their own children, Robert Kamin’s brother Bruce told the Chronicle. They had recently moved to the area and were in the middle of renovating their house.”

Adopted son with a black belt in karate ‘strangled his parents after argument over being suspended from school’
[Daily Mail 2/1/12 by Michael Zennie, Louise Boyle and Rachel Quigley]

Update 3: Moses pled not guilty on Monday March 5, 2012. His preliminary hearing is set for April 16, 2012.

Oakland teen who killed parents enters not guilty plea
[Mercury News 3/6/12 by Paul T. Rosynsky]

“Police did not disclose how the two were killed.

Oakland police Officer Phong Tran said in a declaration filed in court that after Moses Kamin was arrested “he provided a full confession of personally killing both his parents.”
Tran said the boy also “provided details of the homicide that are consistent with the evidence recovered at the scene.”

Oakland teen pleads not guilty to charges he murdered his parents
[KTVU 3/5/12]

“Kamin, a psychologist for the San Francisco jail system, and Poff, who treated homeless patients at San Francisco’s Housing and Urban Health Clinic, adopted the teen in 2002.”
Boy pleads not guilty in killing adoptive parents
[Times-Standard 3/5/12 by Associated Press]

Update 4: Moses ” said in a recorded statement played in court Tuesday [September 11, 2012] that he killed his adoptive parents in a fit of anger after he was suspended from school for smoking marijuana.”

“In an interview with Oakland police Officer Ervieto Perez-Angeles and Sgt. Rachel Van Sloten on Jan. 28 that was played in Kamin’s preliminary hearing in Alameda County Superior Court Tuesday, Kamin at first denied any involvement in his parents’ deaths and then blamed them on a friend.

But after Perez-Angeles yelled and swore at him and said, “I’m tired of your lies,” Kamin admitted that he killed both of his parents on the evening of Jan. 26, the day after he had been suspended from school.

Kamin said he first got into a confrontation with his mother when she talked to him about his suspension.

Kamin said he had studied martial arts for many years and used a chokehold to strangle her from behind because “I wanted her to pass out and calm down” but he eventually killed her.

The youth said that when his father came home a few hours later he decided to kill him as well, saying, “I love you, I’m sorry” as he strangled him.

Kamin said, “I was flipping out” after he killed his parents and thought about jumping out a window or hanging himself.

He said he next dragged his parents to their PT Cruiser and tried to set the car ablaze so he would die and all of their bodies would burn, but the cloth he had attached to the car’s gas tank didn’t ignite so he abandoned that idea.

Kamin’s karate instructor, George Morrison, testified that he teaches chokeholds to all of his students, including Kamin but he stresses safety and he doesn’t know of any other students who have used them to harm anyone.

Morrison said that when he heard that Kamin’s parents had been killed and Kamin had been arrested, “I didn’t believe it could be Moses.”

He said, “I never saw anything to make me believe he could do it, ever.”

But Morrison said he recently developed doubts about Kamin because another student told him that Kamin had gotten into trouble at school for throwing a chair and asked the student if he knew where he could get brass knuckles or a switchblade knife.

Kamin’s lawyer, Andrew Steckler, told Judge Morris Jacobson, who was presiding over the hearing, that he will focus on the admissibility of Kamin’s statements to police.

The purpose of the preliminary hearing is to determine if there’s enough evidence to order Kamin to stand trial on the two murder charges.

Steckler told Jacobson that if the case goes to a trial the defense may focus on what he described as Kamin’s “adolescent fixation on his birth siblings.”

Kamin told police that he has a brother and a sister from his birth parents but he was adopted by the Kamins when he was six years old.

Kamin’s preliminary hearing would continue the next day and may not conclude until the following Monday.’

Oakland teen admits killing parents in interview played in court

[KTVU 9/12/12]

“For more than an hour, 15-year-old Moses Kamin sat in a police interrogation room denying that he killed his parents, continually weaving through a series of alleged false stories about what happened to the couple who adopted him.

The videotaped interrogation, which was played in court Tuesday during a preliminary hearing against Kamin, who is charged as an adult for the murder of Robert Kamin, 54, and Susan Poff, 50, shows the teenager becoming increasingly agitated as police officer and sergeant tell him they don’t believe his stories.

Officers who responded to the house where Kamin’s parents died had collected evidence implicating Kamin as the possible killer and the teenager’s stories were not making much sense.

First, Kamin told police that he had watched as both his parents left the house together, without saying a word, and walked down Athol Avenue where they lived toward Lake Merritt.

When Ofc. Eriverto Perez-Angeles and Sergeant Rachel Van Sloten said that story was unbelievable, Kamin then blamed the killing on a friend he said he met two weeks prior named Chico. Kamin said he watched as Chico choked his mother and then later his father.

But again, the police interviewers said they found the story hard to believe.

“This whole Chico thing isn’t flying cause someone you know for just two weeks isn’t just going to come in and help you kill your parents,” Van Sloten said. “We’re here to help you get your side of the story out. Was it you?”

Kamin looked at Van Sloten, put his head down, and began to cry.

“I did it with the arm thing. I put a shirt on her afterwards because she was still there,” Kamin said referencing a choke hold he said he learned at karate school and a T-shirt that was found tied around Poff’s neck. “I wasn’t trying to kill her.”

Kamin said he reacted without thought on Jan. 27 when his mother confronted him about being suspended from school for smoking marijuana. Kamin said he had gotten in trouble in the past and at that moment did not want to deal with his parents being angry at him.

“I was just like tired of getting in trouble,” Kamin said. “I wasn’t even thinking about it, I just wanted her to pass out.”

Kamin said he didn’t know what to do after his mother died. He said he didn’t really know he killed her but began to “freak out” when she urinated and then went limp after he placed her in a choke hold for about seven seconds. Kamin said he then tied a T-shirt around her neck, dragged her to a dark room and waited for his father to return from work.

When his father walked through the front door, the now 16-year-old said he went behind him and began to choke his father. Kamin, who weighed about 200 pounds, outweighed his parents by at least 50 pounds and had been training in karate since 2003.

“I said, ‘I love you. Sorry,'” Kamin said he told his father as he choked him to death.

Kamin said he then thought of killing himself. He placed both dead bodies in the family’s PT Cruiser that was parked in the driveway of their home at 284 Athol. He tried to light the gas tank on fire but failed.

At that point, he said, he just decided to go inside and wait.

Police arrived the next day he said and found the bodies in the car.

When asked what he was thinking as he choked his parents, Kamin said, “I was just sad.””

Dramatic police interrogation interview shows Oakland teenager admitting killing parents

[Oakland Tribune 9/12/12 by Paul T. Rosynsky]

“Kamin also told police, after his confession, that he has had issues with anger management ever since he was “little,” and spoke of the time before he was placed in foster care and eventually adopted by the parents he killed when he was physically and emotionally abused.

Kamin said he remembered that when he was 4 years old, he was locked in a dark room for three days without food, only finding a bathroom after he located a light switch. He also spoke about having food taken from him as punishment and about how one day he found frozen Eggo waffles in the freezer and ate them because he was so hungry.

With those statements as a backdrop, Steckler questioned Officer Eriberto Perez-Angeles, the lead interrogator in the case, about the conditions in which Kamin was left for almost 12 hours before he was questioned.

Steckler questioned the officer about how he and others frequently checked in on Kamin, trying to building a rapport with the teenager before reading him his rights and beginning questioning.

Stecker’s questions focused on how officers put on an appearance of friendliness toward Kamin and about how those contacts could have confused the teenager about what rights he had.

Perez-Angeles admitted that he attempted to calm Kamin by being nice to him and frequently made physical contact with him in hopes of easing Kamin’s worries and getting him to confess. That contact included frequently touches on Kamin’s forearm and, at times, endearing shoulder pats.

“I promise you, you will feel better after you tell us. We can do this together,” Perez-Angeles said at one point during the interview.

Alameda County Superior Court Judge Morris Jacobson will decide next week whether Kamin understood his rights and whether a prosecutor has presented enough evidence to put him on trial before a jury on charges of murder.”

Defense questions if teenager knew his rights before confessing to killing parents

[Oakland Tribune 9/13/12 by Paul T. Rosynsky]

Update 5: “About a month before 15-year-old Moses Kamin allegedly choked his parents to death, he told a school counselor that he was frustrated with the couple who adopted him and cautioned that “his father better not hit him first,” the counselor testified Monday.

Isabelle Waigi said that discussion with Kamin came after he described a physical confrontation he had with his mother, Susan Poff, 50, who was upset with him after he took the family’s PT Cruiser and went on a joy ride with some friends.

Waigi said she asked Kamin if he would harm his parents, and “he said no, he wouldn’t hurt them because he loved his mother, but he said his father better not hit him first.”

The discussion caused Waigi to call a meeting with Poff to discuss her son’s recent revelations, she said. In that meeting, she said, Poff dismissed the incident and told her it came about after she hit him on the head, and he responded by grabbing her hands and pushing her against a wall.

“She said it was nothing,” Waigi said.

That was the last time Waigi met with Kamin before his parents were found dead in their car outside their home at 284 Athol Ave.

Kamin, who is 5 feet 9 inches tall and weighed about 200 pounds at the time, has been charged as an adult with two counts of murder. He admitted during a police interrogation that he used a chokehold he learned in karate school to kill Poff and his father, Robert Kamin, 54.”

“Waigi’s testimony came in a preliminary hearing being held in the case during which Superior Court Judge Morris Jacobson will decide if a prosecutor has presented enough evidence to send Kamin, now 16, before a jury for murder.

Jacobson’s ruling will depend on his decision of whether or not to allow Kamin’s confession to be admitted as evidence in the case. Kamin’s attorney, assistant public defender Drew Steckler, has challenged the confession’s legality, arguing that Kamin was too young and not intelligent enough to understand he had a right not to speak to police officers.

But deputy district attorney Joe Goethals has argued that Kamin did understand his rights and pointed to a portion of Waigi’s testimony in which the counselor described how Kamin eventually refused to speak with her.

Waigi testified that her sessions with Kamin were voluntary and that he was told, during their first session in October, that he had the right not to meet with her. Three months later, she said, he told her he no longer wanted to meet.

Waigi was one of three witnesses called Monday by Steckler to provide evidence showing that Kamin had a learning disability and struggled, at times, understanding.

Another witness, Shawn Usha, an educational therapist, said he had diagnosed Kamin with having “the profile of a learning disability.” Usha said several tests he had Kamin take showed that the teenager had trouble processing information and that his academic skills were “very weak.”

Goethals and Steckler will make arguments in the preliminary hearing Wednesday, after which Jacobson will decide if the confession can be used as evidence and whether there is enough evidence to move the case to trial.”

School counselor testifies in case of Oakland teen accused of killing parents

[Mercury News 9/18/12 by Paul T. Rosynsky/Oakland Tribune]

“Waigi said that on one occasion he pushed his mother, 50-year-old  Susan Poff, up against a wall and held her arms because “she was acting up.”

Asked by Goethals if Kamin had told her he’d been involved in a  physical altercation with his father, 55-year-old Robert Kamin, Waigi said  the teenager told him “his father used to hit him but he didn’t hit him  anymore.”

“He said he had just been suspended from school for smoking  marijuana and he didn’t want to deal with his mother’s anger.

The Oakland police officers who interrogated Kamin read him his  Miranda rights advising him of his right to have an attorney, but his defense  lawyer, Andrew Steckler, is seeking to have Kamin’s confession thrown out  because he doesn’t think Kamin had the experience or intelligence necessary  to understand what those rights meant.

Steckler today presented four witnesses, including Waigi, who  testified that Kamin had a learning disability, had below-average  intelligence and wasn’t doing well in school. His strategy appeared to be to  support his contention that Kamin didn’t understand his legal rights.

A staff member at the Envision Academy of Arts and Technology in  Oakland, where Kamin was a ninth-grader, said he only had a 1.63 grade point  average on a scale in which 4.0 is the highest score.

Rebecca Thomas, the executive director of The Roleplay Workshop in  Oakland, an after-school program for students with learning issues, said,  “Moses was a little behind the curve and slow and had difficulty  comprehending things.”

But Steckler’s strategy may have backfired when Waigi said that  after Kamin had participated in six counseling sessions with her he exercised  his right not to participate in any more sessions.

Alameda County Superior Court Judge Morris Jacobson, who is  presiding over the hearing, said Kamin’s exercise of his right not to have  any more counseling sessions “sounds similar to a Miranda warning” about his  right to have a lawyer present when he was questioned by police.”

Teen accused of murdering parents had expressed frustration

[KTVU 9/17/12]

“An Oakland teenager must stand trial as an adult on charges that he murdered his  adoptive parents after arguing with his mother over being suspended from school,  a judge ruled Wednesday.”

“A videotape of the boy’s statement to police was played during his  preliminary hearing.

His attorney, Assistant Public  Defender Drew Steckler, tried unsuccessfully to have the judge throw out the  videotaped statement on the grounds that his client didn’t understand his legal  rights. Steckler said he plans to appeal that decision and try to have the case  transferred to Juvenile Court.”

Oakland teen to be tried in parents’ deaths

[San Francisco Chronicle 9/19/12 by Henry K. Lee]

Update 6: “A 16-year-old charged with two counts of murder in the killings of the parents who adopted him has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity as his attorney cited a rarely discussed mental disorder that affects some adopted children.

Moses Kamin suffers from dissociative disorder caused in part from early childhood trauma coupled with failed attempts to find his biological parents, Kamin’s attorney Drew Steckler said.

Kamin is accused of killing Susan Poff, 50, and Robert Kamin, 54, by strangling the couple to death using a choke hold he learned in karate.

The killings occurred on Jan. 26 as Kamin, then 15, allegedly argued with his mother about being suspended from school for smoking marijuana. After killing his mother, police have said, Kamin waited in a dark room for his father to return from work and then surprised him with a choke hold after he entered their home at 284 Athol Avenue.

Kamin was charged as an adult in the crimes.

Steckler said his client suffers from several mental disorders that stem from a troubled early childhood during which he and his siblings were homeless and scavenged for food in trash cans around Oakland. After being adopted, Steckler said, Kamin had memories of that early childhood and sought information about his biological family but his efforts were stymied.

“It doesn’t make sense to just strangle your parents to death because you are arguing about being suspended from school for smoking marijuana,” Steckler said. “His mind was not right.”

 

In addition to having a dissociative disorder, Steckler said his client also suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and reactive attachment disorder.

Steckler said a mental health expert hired by the defense has already diagnosed Kamin with the disorders but with the plea entered, Kamin must now undergo analysis from two court-appointed psychologists or psychiatrists.

The findings of the court-appointed mental health experts can then be challenged by either Steckler or the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office during a trial before a jury. Such a trial would take place immediately after a jury decides whether or not Kamin is guilty of the crimes.

If both experts find Kamin is insane, prosecutors could agree to the findings and Kamin would then be sent to a state mental health facility such as Napa State Hospital.

Teresa Drenick, spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office, declined to comment on the case.

Earlier this year, a judge ruled that prosecutors had presented enough evidence during a preliminary hearing to send Kamin before a jury on two charges of murder. Evidence presented at the hearing included a video-recorded interrogation of Kamin during which he admitted to the killings and revealed that he attempted suicide after killing his parents.

Steckler said the confluence of disorders suffered by his client resulted in the murder.

“We are talking about a subset of adoptees that suffer dissociative disorders and within that subset, there is another subset that commits homicide against their adoptive parents,” Steckler said. “I’m not saying this was justified. It’s a crime that fits a tragic pattern and it’s profoundly sad.”

Results of the analysis of Kamin are scheduled to be presented to a judge next week.”

Oakland teen accused of killing parents claims mental disorder, pleads not guilty

[Mercury News 10/31/12 by Paul T. Rosynsky]

Update 7: “A judge Friday[November 9, 2012] denied a defense motion seeking to have the charges  against an Oakland teenager accused of murdering his adoptive parents in  January dismissed on the ground that the teen’s confession shouldn’t be  admitted into evidence.

Judge refuses to drop charges against teen accused of killing parents

[KTVU 11/9/12]

Update 8: “A teenage boy has admitted to murdering his  adoptive parents in the family home and is facing life in prison.

Moses Kamin, 16, pleaded guilty at Alameda County Superior Court in Oakland,  California on Monday to the murders of Susan Poff, 50, and 55-year-old Robert  Kamin.

Kamin was 15 when he strangled his mother,  using a choke hold learned in karate class, when the pair got into an argument  over his suspension from school.

He then hid her body and lay in wait at the  family home for his father and strangled him on January 27 of this  year.

The teenager, who is now 16, is being tried  as an adult and is expected to be handed 25 years to life in prison after he  accepted a last-minute plea deal.

He pleaded guilty to the first-degree murder of  his mother and the second-degree murder of his father. Kamin is due to be  sentenced on January 25. ”

Teenage boy facing life in prison for murder of adoptive parents after an argument about being suspended from school

[Daily Mail 12/11/12 by Louise Boyle]

Update 9: “A 16-year-old Oakland boy was sentenced today to 25 years in state prison for murdering his adoptive parents last January.

The sentence for Moses Kamin was agreed to on Dec. 10 when he pleaded guilty to second-degree murder for killing his adoptive mother, 50-year-old Susan Poff, and to first-degree murder for killing 55-year-old Robert Kamin, his adoptive father, at the family’s home at 284 Athol Ave. in Oakland the night of Jan. 26, 2012.

Kamin was 15 at the time but was charged and prosecuted as an adult.

Alameda County Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Horner sentenced Kamin to 25 years to life for murdering his father and 15 years to life for murdering his mother but stayed the sentence for murdering his mother.

Poff and Robert Kamin both worked for the San Francisco Department of Public Health and adopted Moses Kamin when he was 6.

In a videotaped interview with Oakland police that was played in court at his preliminary hearing last fall, Moses Kamin told investigators he killed his adoptive parents in a fit of anger by using a chokehold he had learned in his years of studying martial arts.

He said he had been suspended from school for smoking marijuana and he didn’t want to deal with them being upset at him.

Poff’s younger brother, David Poff, told Kamin today that he “made a choice to embrace evil” when he killed his parents but said he could still change his life and “look for goodness in the world.”

However, Poff said Kamin shouldn’t be paroled when he becomes eligible in 24 years because he thinks Kamin will still be a threat to society, saying, “If Moses is released and kills again, it will be a failure of justice.”

Kamin’s lawyer, Andrew Steckler, said he believes that Kamin killed his adoptive parents because they represented “an obstacle” to him reuniting with his birth mother and birth siblings and said he doesn’t think Kamin would ever kill anyone else if he were released from prison.

But prosecutor Stacie Pettigrew said Kamin had “a murderous state of mind” before he killed his adoptive parents and had written in his diary about his fantasy of killing his mother with a sharp knife and about slicing out her intestines and forcing her to eat them before she died.

Pettigrew also said there was evidence that Kamin belonged to the Norteno gang and had told someone that in order to become a full member, he had to kill someone.”

Teen gets 25 years to life for murdering parents

[ABC 1/25/13]

“An 11-year old Moses Kamin peers into the lens of his adoptive mother’s camera, clad in a bright yellow tank top, a faint smile below his dark brown buzz-cut.

“He looks so different now,” said Steve Masover, looking at the photo album. “But last time I saw him before the sentencing, his hair was the same.”

Masover turns the page of the photo album, showing me another picture of Moses alongside a smiling little girl with golden pigtails. They are playing.

“What I’m trying to figure out is who this person is,” he said, pointing to the young boy in the photo, “because none us had any clue that something like this was coming.”

Masover witnessed Moses grow up and was a long-time friend of Susan Poff and Bob Kamin, who in 2002 adopted Moses after he experienced a string of abusive foster care placements. By all accounts, they brought stability and love to the life of a boy who had never experienced either.

On Jan. 26, 2012, Moses choked Poff to death when she returned from work. He then waited until Kamin came home, and strangled him too. Moses was only 15 at the time.

Now 17, Moses may reside in his final state-ordered placement: the California correctional system. He was charged as an adult, pleaded guilty to charges of first- and second-degree murders, and was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.

“I know you all think of me as a monster or something else,” the young man told a judge and jury just moments before his sentence. “I’m just going to fade away. I hope none of you remember me ever again.”

As Masover relives those last moments in the Alameda County courtroom, his eyes become downcast and he shakes his head. “I’ve written to him and told him that’s not on the table, that people are not going to forget about him.”

With only their exchange of a few voicemails and letters, he remains one of few people still in contact with Moses. Kamin’s lawyer, Alameda County Public Defender Andrew Steckler, contended that Moses’ upbringing, born in squalor and bred in abuse, is at the heart of his actions. Masover is not so sure.

“There’s never a straight line,” Masover said. “There are people who go through those experiences and who don’t commit double parricide.”

Moses’ Earliest Years

Moses Kamin was born in San Jose on April 3, 1996, to Rosa Smith. According to court documents detailing his “traumatic history,” Moses visited the emergency room several times for various “accidents”, and when he was only a year old social services was called for reports of “neglect, yelling, forceful yanking, and [his] incessant crying.”

Moses was the third born to Smith but her first two children had already been removed from custody “due to neglect and abuse.”

On Sept. 10, 1999, a social worker made an unannounced visit to his mother’s home and found Moses “without any clothes on, smelling strong of urine, and found baby bottles with curdled milk.” Despite these conditions and Smith’s long history with child protective services, the three-year boy remained in his mother’s custody.

Moses was finally removed from his mother a few months later after he and his toddler brother were found unsupervised, playing in the street naked save for their diapers while their mother slept inside.

“Those first years are about forming empathic bonds…that’s when people learn empathy for others and it sounds like this woman, his birth mom, was trouble,” Masover said. “Serious drug addiction, serious mental problems.”

In court documents, it was reported that Smith had a “history of substance abuse, interpersonal abuse, domestic violence, and financial issues.” In a psychological evaluation ordered by the defense counsel, Moses’ mother stated that she “had thoughts about killing [her] own mother because [she] was so angry with her.”

These elements of his mother’s own struggles retrospectively shed a morbid light on the events that would eventually land Moses behind bars for the greater part of his adulthood.

In a court-ordered psychological evaluation by Dr. Amy Watts after the murders, Moses reported having few memories of his birth mother. During one interview, Moses remembered that he had to “fight hard in order to eat and to sleep.” One of his earliest memories involves him being outside on the street, without his mother, digging through garbage cans for food.

Moses vividly recounted to Watts finding a hot dog covered in ants and taking a bite of it before giving it to his younger brother and baby sister to share [also born to Smith]. He was three.

After his removal, Moses then lived through three years of dependency hearings, abusive foster homes, and near-adoptions before meeting his adoptive parents.

From ages three to six, Moses was placed in several different homes and the reports were mixed. The case files described one family who recounted having no troubles where another one reported Moses having “many difficult behaviors such as grabbing and stealing others’ things, hitting, kicking, not listening, and staring when confronted by the foster parents.” In Watts’ detailed psychological history of Moses, she notes him having “obsessions with food,” and even hoarding it in his bedroom, likely due to being severely neglected by his birth mother.

These details were among the several listed by his defense, who argued for Moses to be tried as a juvenile and pointed to these as contributing factors to the behavioral issues Moses would exhibit throughout his childhood and early adolescence. These horrific stories were also indicated by Watts and his defense as shaping Moses’ “lack of emotional attachment”, poor self-control, and aggressive behaviors that would follow in his teens.

Histories similar to Moses’ are not rare, and a majority of foster youth will experience multiple placements before either being permanently adopted or reunified with their birth family. Nearly two-thirds of California foster children experience two placements or more by their second birthday, according to the University of California-Berkeley’s Child Welfare Database, and 20 percent experience more than two placements.

A 2012 study out of University of California-San Diego found that foster children who have experienced placement instability are more likely than other children in foster care to show symptoms of mental health disorders and to receive outpatient mental health treatment.

“Not only is placement change associated with mental health problems, it is also a disruptive experience,” the study said. “When children change placements they must break ties with former caregivers, move to a new environment, and establish an attachment to their new families.”

In a psychological consultation report submitted to the court during Moses’ homicide case, he recalls being hit on his head by a cane while strapped into a car seat. On another occasion while in foster care, Moses recalls being locked in a basement for two weeks, in the dark. He also reported times where he was “tied up, held down, and slapped.”

During the three years Moses was in foster care, there were two failed attempts for adoption. In both cases, the potential adoptive parents changed their minds about adopting Moses due to his “behavior issues.”, according to his foster care history described in the court documents.

It would not be until 2002, and three years in foster care, that he would meet and eventually move in with the Kamins.

Life After Adoption

Poff and Kamin adopted Moses when he was six. Poff, 50, worked with homeless adults for the San Francisco Department of Public Health. Kamin, 55, was a psychologist for the city’s jails.

On paper, they were the ideal parents for a boy with a troubled past.

“If anyone could help this kid, it was them,” Masover said. “Given that humanity’s timber is crooked, you couldn’t have picked a more beneficial, supportive situation to come into out of the hell that he had after his first six years.”

When Moses was first adopted, Masover said, “he thought everyone was his mom.” He’d repeatedly ask Susan Poff if he was “going to be sent away again. He was a pretty affectionate kid when he was little…he was a little shy around all these adults but then he would come out.”

From the earliest years with his adoptive parents, Masover said, Moses was surrounded with a warm community of friends and family close to the Kamins. “Occasionally we would get together with other families and Moses seemed to get along with the other kids really well. …I’ve seen it in person, I’ve seen it in pictures.”

Despite Masover’s fond retellings of the normalcy first displayed by six-year old Moses, he also knew there were problems. And so did the Kamins. “I knew all along…Susan was always talking about Moses…because she was his mom,” Masover said when referring to the behavioral issues which did not take long to surface.

Even after reviewing court documents, it is still unclear just how privy the Kamins were to Moses’ dark past.

“He was starting with all the cards stacked against him and Bob and Susan knew that,” Masover said. “They would have had access to some of his records [at the time of the adoption]. They knew some stories.”

Even with sealed records, Poff and Kamin comprehended enough about their new son’s past to start Moses in therapy from the moment they adopted him. He would remain with the same therapist until just one week before the murders.

According to a psychological evaluation conducted the year Poff and Kamin adopted Moses, his behavioral issues included trouble sleeping, poor attention, aggression, cruelty to animals, and difficulty relating to other children. He tended to engage in fantasy play with violent themes.

The psychologist diagnosed Moses with Attention Deficit Disorder, Conduct Disorder, Reactive Attachment Disorder, and Borderline Intellectual Functioning.

In kindergarten, Moses was academically behind and it was reported that Bob and Susan “spent a lot of time teaching him and helping him to catch up in school.”  They assessed him for special education but, at the time, he did not qualify.  They made sure he saw a therapist at school everyday.

In middle and high school, his problems continued. Moses often had a difficult time getting along with teachers and was reported to have “cussed them out.”  An evaluation used by the defense also noted that he “had a hard time getting along with others.” and once even “head-butted another student” after the student had made a comment about his adoptive mother and aunt. Moses broke his nose.

As Moses continued to grow up, behavioral issues in school and at home only exacerbated.

In an interview by an investigator from the Alameda Public Defender’s Office, the brother of Moses’ adoptive father (Bruce) stated that Susan was “strict with Moses.” It was reported that she “often yelled at Moses for getting into trouble and not doing well in school.”

Moses and Susan reportedly had a conflict-laden relationship. They often engaged in yelling matches at home. Moses stated, in an interview with a Watts , that he did not have a good relationship with his adoptive father.

Despite these challenges, Poff and Kamin refused to send Moses away, a notion suggested more than once by those close to the family, Masover said. “Susan was one of the most morally driven and committed people I’ve ever know in my life and one of the things that was a cornerstone of her life’s commitment was that she was never sending Moses back anywhere.”

When being evaluated by Watts, during court proceedings, Moses stated that his adoptive mother “slapped [him] once.” Moses explained that he did “not like when people hit or touched him on the head. When people made contact with [his] head, it reminded him of the times when he was abused by his birth mother and while he was in foster care.”

Moses referred to his reaction to being touched on the head as “clicking off.”

January 26, 2013

On the day of the killings, Moses told police that he had an argument with his mother over being  suspended from school for using marijuana. Authorities confirmed that he was facing expulsion for the infraction.

In Watts’ evaluation detailing Moses’ account of what happened the night of the

murders, she wrote that, “according to Moses, his adoptive mother started yelling at him. She hit him on the top of his head” out of frustration.

At that moment, Moses told Watts, he “clicked off.”

What is known is that Moses choked the life out of his adoptive mother. He then waited for his father to return, fearful of his adoptive father’s reaction to killing Poff, and strangled him to death as well. When they were both dead, he placed them in the family car parked on the street, and attempted to set it on fire.

He got in the car with them, hoping it would explode. When no explosion came, Moses returned to the house, leaving the bodies of his adoptive parents in the car.

Steckler, Kamin’s lawyer, wrote in a letter asking for Moses to be tried in juvenile court, rather than adult criminal court, that “Moses is a deeply psychologically troubled child. But by no stretch of the imagination is he evil”.

Masover explained that, “Drew [Steckler] tried many number of times to get the case remanded to juvenile court” and that he “wanted the support of the [Kamin] family to have the case remanded. It didn’t work out.”

A 2012 Harvard University literature review, examining the recidivism rates of juveniles who commit homicide and, specifically, parricide, offered an analysis which indicated that juvenile parricide offenders recidivate less than juvenile homicide offenders in general.

But Dr. Marieke Liem, the author of the review, concluded it was difficult to predict such an outcome given the limited data available and pointed to a need for further research on this rare population.

After the Sentencing

I ask Masover if he believes Moses is broken. He takes a moment before responding.

“One of the difficulties for me is, a person murdering another person in any other terms other than broken…that’s by definition broken, as far as I’m concerned,” he said.

Moses had written him from juvenile hall to say that he was, “finally ready to tell [him] what happened that night.” Masover does not seem ready for that conversation just yet.

“I would like to see that he could grow into a person where one of the ways he can restore the damage he has caused to the world is by continuing the work of the people he took out of this world.”

Masover wonders aloud if his wish is too unrealistic or all too poetic for such a tragic story.

“The best closure that I can imagine for this situation,” he said, “is that Moses can turn his life around and do good work for other people in prison…whether or not he gets out. But that won’t bring Susan and Bob back.”

Helping Moses Kamin Too Little Too Late?

[Oakland Local 6/26/13 by Lauren Gonzalves]

Update 10/August 8, 2013

“Clad in a bright-yellow tank top, Moses Kamin peered into the lens of his adoptive mother’s camera. A faint smile emerged below the eleven-year-old’s dark-brown buzz-cut. “He looks so different now,” said Steve Masover, looking at the photo of Moses recently. “But last time I saw him before the sentencing, his hair was the same.”

Masover turned the page of the photo album, displaying another picture of Moses alongside a smiling little girl with golden pigtails. They are playing. “What I’m trying to figure out is who this person is,” Masover said, pointing to Moses, “because none us had any clue that something like this was coming.”

Masover watched Moses grow up and was a longtime friend of Susan Poff and Bob Kamin, who adopted Moses in 2002 after he had endured severe abuse and neglect at the hands of his biological mother and several foster-care parents. By all accounts, Poff and Kamin brought stability and love to the life of a boy who had never experienced either.

The Oakland couple also appeared to have been the ideal parents for a child with a troubled past. Poff, 50, worked with homeless adults for the San Francisco Department of Public Health, and Kamin, 55, was a psychologist for the city’s jails. “If anyone could help this kid, it was them,” Masover said.

But while Poff and Kamin possessed more knowledge, experience, and resources than the average prospective adoptive parents, it is unclear how detailed of a history they received when they adopted Moses. Laws and practices that keep some information about juveniles confidential may have prevented the couple from fully realizing the harmful and lasting impacts the abuse had on him.

The story of Moses and his adoptive parents also helps illustrate a burden that adoption agencies and social workers shoulder when dealing with children who have been badly abused and neglected: These kids desperately need to find stable, caring homes so as to break the cycle of abuse that is all too common in the foster-care system, but disclosing too much information about a child’s traumatic history may scare off many prospective parents. In addition, experts say that a lack of support services for adoptive parents of abused and neglected kids is a chronic problem nationwide.

On January 26, 2012, after an argument with Poff, Moses choked his adoptive mother to death. He then waited until Kamin came home and strangled him, too. Moses was fifteen at the time.

Now seventeen, Moses resides in what could be his final state-ordered placement: the California correctional system. He was charged as an adult in Alameda County Superior Court, pleaded guilty to charges of first- and second-degree murder, and was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.

“I know you all think of me as a monster or something else,” the young man told a judge just moments before his sentencing earlier this year. “I’m just going to fade away. I hope none of you remember me ever again.”

As Masover recalled those moments in court, his eyes cast down and he shook his head. “I’ve written to him and told him that’s not on the table — that people are not going to forget about him,” Masover said.

With only their exchange of a few voicemails from the juvenile detention center and brief letters, Masover remains one of few people still in contact with Moses.

Moses’ attorney, Alameda County Assistant Public Defender Andrew Steckler, contended that the boy’s troubled upbringing, born in squalor and bred in abuse, led to his violent actions.

Moses was born in San Jose on April 3, 1996, to Rosa Smith. According to court records, he was only a year old when social services was called for reports of “neglect, yelling, forceful yanking, and [his] incessant crying.” Moses was the third child born to Smith; her first two children had already been removed from custody “due to neglect and abuse.”

On September 10, 1999, a social worker made an unannounced visit to Smith’s home and discovered Moses “without any clothes on, smelling strong[ly] of urine.” The social worker also found “baby bottles with curdled milk.” Despite these conditions and Smith’s long history with child protective services, the three-year-old boy remained in his mother’s custody.

Child Protective Services eventually took Moses away from his mother a few months later after he and his toddler brother were found unsupervised, playing in the street, wearing nothing but diapers while their mother slept inside her home. According to court documents, Smith had a “history of substance abuse, interpersonal abuse, domestic violence, and financial issues.” In a psychological and social history presented by Moses’ defense attorney during his criminal court case, Smith had once told psychologists that she “had thoughts about killing [her] own mother because [she] was so angry with her.”

In a court-ordered psychological evaluation by clinical psychologist Amy Watts following the murders, Moses reported having few memories of his biological mother. During one interview with Watts, Moses remembered that he had to “fight hard in order to eat and to sleep.”

One of his earliest memories involved him being outside on the street, without his mother, digging through garbage cans for food. Moses also vividly recounted finding a hot dog covered in ants and taking a bite of it before giving it to his younger brother and baby sister (also born to Smith) to share. He was three at the time.

After Child Protective Services (CPS) removed him from Smith’s care, Moses lived through three years of dependency hearings, abusive foster homes, and near-adoptions before finally meeting his adoptive parents. From ages three to six, he was placed in several different homes. The case files described one family that recounted having no troubles, but another one reported Moses having “many difficult behaviors such as grabbing and stealing others’ things, hitting, kicking, not listening, and staring when confronted by the foster parents.” In Watts’ detailed psychological history of Moses, she noted him having “obsessions with food,” and even hoarding it in his bedroom, likely as a result of being neglected by his birth mother.

These details were among numerous others presented to the judge by Steckler, who argued for Moses to be tried as a juvenile, contending that he was damaged by the system. Watts and Steckler also contended that the horrible experiences of Moses’ early life shaped his lack of emotional attachment and led to poor self-control and aggressive behavior that would follow into his teens.

Troubled childhood histories similar to the one that Moses experienced are not rare, and a majority of foster youth experience multiple placements before either being permanently adopted or reunited with their birth family. According to UC Berkeley’s Child Welfare Database, nearly two-thirds of California foster children experience two placements or more by their second birthday, and 20 percent of those children experience more than two placements.

A 2012 UC San Diego study found that foster children who have experienced placement instability are more likely than other children in foster care to show symptoms of mental health disorders and to receive outpatient mental health treatment. “Not only is placement change associated with mental health problems, it is also a disruptive experience,” the study stated. “When children change placements they must break ties with former caregivers, move to a new environment, and establish an attachment to their new families.”

In a psychological consultation report submitted to the court during Moses’ criminal case, he recalled being hit on his head by a cane while strapped into a car seat. On another occasion while in foster care, Moses remembered being locked in a basement for two weeks, in the dark. He also reported times in which he was “tied up, held down, and slapped.”

A 1999 United Kingdom study examined why children in out-of-home placements are especially susceptible to repeated abuse. It found that “certain children are more vulnerable [particularly] young children, children with disabilities, and children with behavioral and emotional difficulties.” The study also found that boys were twice as likely as girls to be physically abused by foster care providers.

“Many kids entering foster care have already been harmed psychologically and emotionally and have developed difficult behaviors experienced as dysfunctional to new [caregivers],” the study said. These experiences make children decidedly more at risk for repeated maltreatment.

During the three years Moses was in foster care, there were two failed adoption attempts. In both cases, the potential adoptive parents changed their minds about adopting Moses due to his “behavior issues,” according to his foster care history as detailed in court records.

It would not be until 2002, and three years in foster care, that he would meet and eventually move in with Susan Poff and Bob Kamin.

Historically, adoption agencies and social workers kept prospective adoptive parents in the dark about a child’s history of abuse and neglect. Since the 1980s, however, laws have required them to provide detailed histories. “The earlier and traditional practice [when adopting a child] had been ‘the less you know, the better,'” said Joan Hollinger, a professor at UC Berkeley’s School of Law and a leading scholar on adoption law and practice. “[But now] there are supposed to be these disclosure meetings and I think these meetings do occur.”

The disclosure meetings to which Hollinger referred are meant to inform the prospective adoption parents of birth records, medical history, and any involvement with CPS. But the process is far from perfect. “As children enter foster care, there is information that goes with them, but there is a lot that slips through the cracks. … And although it is now an obligation to disclose what is in the record, there remains this gap with neglect and abuse cases,” Hollinger said.

Hollinger explained that confidentiality rules block adoption agencies and social workers from disclosing everything. For example, they typically will not disclose allegations of abuse that were never proven.

Some of the psychological evaluations that detailed Moses’ traumatic history were presented in court after the teen had killed his adoptive parents. As such, exactly what Poff and Kamin knew about Moses’ childhood may never be fully known. For example, it’s not clear whether they knew of Moses being hit on the head with a cane while in foster care.

Hollinger also said that adoption agencies and social workers do not have an obligation to warn prospective parents about connections between child abuse and violent behavior later on.

At the same time, child social workers have an ethical responsibility to help abused and neglected kids find permanent homes and not keep them dangling in the foster care system. “You’re a caseworker trying to complete and finalize a placement for a kid who certainly needs permanency, and you’re committed to having this file be closed in what seems a positive way,” Hollinger explained. “So how can you then sit there across the table from the prospective parents and say, ‘There are 99 red flags there and let’s talk about how serious this is.'”

So, what’s the answer? What can be changed systemically to create a more transparent adoption process?

Hollinger said she doesn’t think additional legislation will solve the problem. Instead, the adoption process involving abused and neglected children should be reformed to become more pragmatic and child-focused. Right now, Hollinger said there’s not much time devoted to how “you get a troubled kid through a week or a day.”

Poff and Kamin adopted Moses when he was six years old. When they first brought him home “he thought everyone was his mom,” Masover said. Moses also repeatedly asked Poff if he was “going to be sent away again,” Masover said.

Yet despite the early traumas, Moses “was a pretty affectionate kid when he was little,” Masover said. “He was a little shy around all these adults but then he would come out.”

From the earliest years with his adoptive parents, Moses was surrounded with a warm community of friends and family close to Poff and Kamin, Masover added. “Occasionally we would get together with other families and Moses seemed to get along with the other kids really well. … I’ve seen it in person, I’ve seen it in pictures.”

Masover said Poff and Kamin “knew some stories” about the abuse Moses endured. “He was starting with all the cards stacked against him and Bob and Susan knew that,” Masover said. The couple also understood enough about their new son’s past to start Moses in therapy from the moment they adopted him. He would remain with the same therapist until just one week before the murders.

According to a psychological evaluation conducted the year Poff and Kamin adopted Moses, his behavioral issues included trouble sleeping, poor attention, aggression, cruelty to animals, and difficulty relating to other children. He tended to engage in fantasy play with violent themes. The psychologist diagnosed Moses with Attention Deficit Disorder, Conduct Disorder, Reactive Attachment Disorder, and Borderline Intellectual Functioning.

In kindergarten, Moses was academically behind and it was reported that Poff and Kamin “spent a lot of time teaching him and helping him to catch up in school.” They assessed him for special education but he did not qualify at the time. They made sure he saw a therapist at school everyday.

But in middle and high school, his problems continued. Moses often had a difficult time getting along with teachers and was reported to have “cussed them out.” An evaluation used by Moses’ lawyers in court noted that he “had a hard time getting along with others” and once even “head-butted another student” after the student had made a comment about his adoptive mother and aunt. Moses broke the other boy’s nose.

As Moses grew older, his behavioral problems also appeared to take a toll on his adoptive parents who reportedly became impatient with him. In an interview by an investigator from the Alameda County Public Defender’s Office, the brother of Moses’ adoptive father, Bruce Kamin, stated that Susan was “strict with Moses.” It was reported that she “often yelled at Moses for getting into trouble and not doing well in school.”

Moses and Poff reportedly had a conflict-laden relationship. They often engaged in yelling matches at home. Moses also told Watts that he did not have a good relationship with Kamin either.

Despite these problems, Poff and Kamin refused to send Moses away, a notion suggested more than once by those close to the family, Masover said. “Susan was one of the most morally driven and committed people I’ve ever know in my life, and one of the things that was a cornerstone of her life’s commitment was that she was never sending Moses back anywhere.”

When being evaluated by Watts, during court proceedings, Moses stated that his adoptive mother “slapped [him] once.” Moses explained that he did “not like when people hit or touched him on the head. When people made contact with [his] head, it reminded him of the times when he was abused by his birth mother and while he was in foster care.”

Moses referred to his reaction to being touched on the head as “clicking off.”

On January 26, 2012, after he murdered Poff and Kamin, Moses told police that he had had an argument with his mother over being suspended from school for using marijuana. Authorities confirmed that he was facing expulsion for the infraction.

“According to Moses, his adoptive mother started yelling at him. She hit him on the top of his head” out of frustration. At that moment, Moses told authorities, he “clicked off.”

Moses choked Poff to death. He then waited for Kamin to return, fearful of his adoptive father’s reaction to killing Poff, and then strangled him to death as well. He then put their bodies in the family car parked on the street, and attempted to set it on fire.

He got in the car with them, hoping to kill himself, too. When no explosion came, he returned to the house, leaving the bodies of his adoptive parents in the vehicle.

Steckler, Moses’ lawyer, wrote in a letter asking for Moses to be tried in juvenile court (rather than adult criminal court), “Moses is a deeply psychologically troubled child. But by no stretch of the imagination is he evil.”

Masover told me that “Drew [Steckler] tried any number of times to get the case remanded to juvenile court” and that he “wanted the support of the [Kamin] family to have the case remanded. It didn’t work out.”

Steckler wanted Moses to be judged in the eyes of the law as a broken child rather than cold-blooded murderer.

Although it may be impossible to know what Poff and Kamin knew about Moses’ troubled upbringing, it’s clear that parents who adopt abused and neglected children are not well-supported and not always well-informed.

And neither are social workers. Jane Troglia, a former adoption social worker and CPS worker in Sacramento County, said social workers simply don’t “always have all the information or have the whole picture” about a child’s past.

The former CPS worker said that it can be difficult at times to substantiate allegations of abuse because of the lack of physical evidence, children changing their story, and social workers taking too long to reach foster children after an accusation has been made. “I had a kid who told me, ‘my bruises faded by the time my social worker made it out to investigate,'” Troglia said.

And according to a recent University of South Carolina, Columbia, study, child abuse is far more common than reports would indicate. The study concluded that the official rates of substantiated child maltreatment and even the referral rates for alleged maltreatment “likely represent only the tip of the iceberg” of all abuse cases. Using local hospitalization and emergency department records of children brought in for injuries, the researchers found that the prevalence of child maltreatment was much greater than official statistics stated based on CPS records alone.

Jill Duerr Berrick, a professor in the School of Social Welfare at UC Berkeley and a prominent scholar on child welfare policy in the United States, agrees with Hollinger that the US needs better post-adoption services, particularly for abused and neglected children. “There is not a systematic path in place to get those kids the services they need … because there is zero federal funding assigned to post-adoption services and there are very few other dollars available to counties,” she said.

After Moses’ sentencing hearing, I asked Masover if he believes Moses is broken. He took a moment before responding. “One of the difficulties for me is, a person murdering another person in any other terms other than broken … that’s by definition broken, as far as I’m concerned,” he said.

Moses had written him from juvenile hall to say that he was “finally ready to tell [him] what happened that night.” Masover, however, does not seem ready for that conversation just yet.

“I would like to see that he could grow into a person where one of the ways he can restore the damage he has caused to the world is by continuing the work of the people he took out of this world,” Masover said.

He wondered if his wish is too unrealistic or all too poetic for such a tragic story. “The best closure that I can imagine for this situation,” he said, “is that Moses can turn his life around and do good work for other people in prison … whether or not he gets out. But that won’t bring Susan and Bob back.”

Bred in Abuse

[East Bay Express 8/7/13 by Lauren Gonzalves]