The Amy and Lisa Page
The Legal Part - Criminal charges
When someone is killed, regardless of whether it's first degree murder, second degree murder, manslaughter, or whatever, the courts are involved. They handle the prosecution of the crime through the court system.
This page will document our experience with the legal system.
I've put the events in reverse chronological order to allow readers to see the latest news first. However, fair warning: these notes are being built randomly starting with the December 3 entry. If you've read this page, you might want to give it a quick scan next time you visit to see if I've added things between or before entries you've already read. I'll commit to not modifying entries once they're made. If I have more to say about any event, I'll explicitly list the additional comments as such.
Thursday, December 3, 1998
Kenneth John LaHaie entered a plea of "guilty" to the agreed two charges. Mike and his mother were in the courtroom. The defendant was asked several times by the judge whether he understood what the charges were, what the agreement was, whether he was accepting this agreement of his own free will, with no coercion or other promises, and a variety of other questions.
He answered yes to all of the questions asked.
The judge asked him to explain in his own words what had happened. He did. I hesitate to try and recreate his words and there were no real surprises in what he said.
Sentencing is set for January 12, 1999.
Tuesday, December 1, 1998
We were notified by the Prosecutor's office in Cheboygan county that the defense was asking for an agreement. The proposal is that the man who killed Amy and injured Lisa would plead guilty to those two crimes in exchange for dropping two charges of OUIL causing Injury for the injuries caused to Jean and Mike. After much thought, we've come to terms with accepting this offer.