'What happened is all your fault,' says writer about slaying

By Javier Erik Olvera, Rocky Mountain News
April 30, 2004

The family and a neighbor of Paul Childs, the developmentally disabled 15-year-old killed by a Denver police officer last summer, received letters Thursday blaming them for the death.

The handwritten, two-page letter, signed I.L.I.P., said the Childs family and friends should have had the teen institutionalized or controlled him before police arrived at his home.

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The boy's mother, Helen Childs, calls it a hate letter and was shocked by comments such as "what happened is all your fault."

On July 5, officer James Turney and two other officers arrived at the home after Childs' sister called 911 to say her brother was threatening their mother with a knife. The boy ignored orders to drop a 13-inch kitchen blade. When Childs moved forward, Turney fired, striking the teen four times.

Turney received a 10-month suspension but is appealing the discipline.

Neighbor Lashon Hall, a friend of the family who has been interviewed by local media several times in the wake of the shooting, also received a letter.

Hall filed a report with Denver police, saying she felt the letter was threatening.

"It's very unfortunate that someone would do that," said Sonny Jackson, police spokesman, shortly after learning about the letter. "It's sad that someone is making them feel uncomfortable, threatened."

It's unclear exactly what steps, if any, police may take because there is no return address on the letter and no immediate indication who wrote it.

Helen Childs opened the letter moments after it arrived, assuming it was one of the many she gets from people offering her their condolences.

By the time she read the second paragraph, she started saying to herself: "God, please don't let me get upset. God, please don't let me get upset."

The third paragraph reads: "Evidently he (Paul Childs) wasn't taught to mind or he'd have dropped it (the knife). . . . Christ Jesus put the responsibility right on the parents. You had 15 years to teach him to mind."

The letter makes references to Helen's and her daughter's weight and says they should have been able to pick up "a chair, a broom and backed" the boy into a corner.

"Your family and all your friends are just as guilty because they knew he had a mental problem and didn't do anything about it," the letter said. "He should have been in an institution or a facility."

Hall received a photocopy of the same letter and said she felt targeted, threatened and upset by its contents.

"I'm appalled by this," said Hall, whose two children, Christopher, 14, and Idaisha, 11, were close to Paul Childs. "People are sick."

The letter also makes brief mention to a claim the family filed against the city asking for reform of police procedures and $5 million.

The family's legal team, including famed attorney Johnnie Cochran, are negotiating with city leaders, but if a settlement isn't reached, a federal lawsuit will be filed.

"God hates obesity and now you are suing the city so you can continue to live high on the hog. . . . Suing the city? That money comes out of the rest of us," the letter said.

The letter goes on to mention several biblical passages and concludes with: "The judgment period is on now for the nations so why don't you call off your blood hounds and set the matter straight."

Helen Childs called a few friends and family members - who gathered at her Thrill Place home in the North Park Hill neighborhood - immediately after reading the letter.

"Whoever did this is sick," said her sister, Ellen Thompson. "How can they say it was Helen's fault - she's not the one who pulled the trigger. No God-loving, God-fearing person would have ever written something like this."

Less than an hour after reading the letter, Helen Childs was still upset, eyes occasionally tearing.

On Tuesday, she sat at her son's graveside, singing him "Happy Birthday." He would have been 16 years old.

"This is upsetting," she said. "I didn't know people could be so mean."

olveraj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-5113

Copyright 2004, Rocky Mountain News. All Rights Reserved.