Two Teens Sent to Mental Center for Dad’s Grisly Death
Two teen-agers were sent to mental health centers for the murder of their father, who was shot by his daughter and chopped up and burned in a wood stove by his son.
Sarah Butler, 15, her brother Timmy, 14, and their mother, Donna, confessed to the Jan. 15 murder of Tim Butler at the family’s ramshackle cabin. The mother is scheduled to be sentenced in August.
Sarah, a cheerleader and honor student, shot her father as he slept and as her mother stood beside her, authorities said. Timmy admitted helping his mother dispose of the body, first by burning it, then by cutting it up with a meat saw and burning the remains in a wood stove.
The three said Butler psychologically abused them, and a psychologist said they feared he would kill them.
District Judge John Henson placed both children in state custody. He recommended the two go to separate treatment centers until their 21st birthdays.
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